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CHARACTERS 



OF 



Shakspeare^s Plajs 



Br WILLIAM HAZLITT. 



BOSTON : 

PUBLISHED BY WELLS AND LILLY. 
1818. 



1 a -^ 



it/ 






TO 

CHARLES LAMB, Esq. 4 ? 

THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED, AS A MARK OF OLD 

FRIENDSHIP 

AND LASTING ESTEEM, 

BY THE AUTHOR. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

PRktACE Vii 

Cymbeline 25 

Facbeth 37 

V ius Caesar 52 

Othello 60 

" non of Athens XJ 

-oiiolanus " 84 

Troilus and Cressida ..*..• 96 

Antony and Cleopatra 107 

Hamlet 114 

The Tempest 124 

The Midsummer Night's Dream 134 

Romeo and Juliet 141 

Lear 156 

Richard II 177 

Henry IV. Part I. and II 186 

Henry V 198 

Henry VI., in Three Parts 208 

Richard III 217 

Henry VIII. . . . , 226 

King John 231 

Twelfth Night ; or, What you Will 241 

1 * 



Vi CONTENTS. 

PAGB 

The Two Gentlemen of Verona :..••• 250 

The Merchant of Venice 253 

The Winter's Tale 261 

All's Well that ends Well 268 

Love's Labour's Lost ' • 273 

Much Ado about Nothing 277 

As You Like It 282 

The Taming of the Shrew 287 

Measure for Measure 294 

The Merry Wives of Windsor 300 

The Comedy of Errours 304 

Doubtful Plays of Shakspeare 308 

Poems and Sonnets * , ... 318 



PREFACE. 



It is observed by Mr. Pope, that " If ever 
any author deserved the name of an original, 
it was Shakspeare. Horner himself drew not 
his art so immediately from the fountains of 
nature; it proceeded through jEgyptain strain- 
ers and channels, and came to him not with- 
out some tincture of the learning, or some 
cast of the models, of those before him. The 
poetry of Shakspeare was inspiration indeed : 
he is not so much an imitator, as an instrument 
of nature ; and it is not so just to say that he 
speaks from her, as that she speaks through him. 
" His characters are so much nature herself, 
that il is a sort of injury to call them by so dis- 
tant a name as copies of her. Those of other 
poets have a constant resemblance, which shews 
that they received them from one another, and 
were but multipliers of the same image : each 



'1 



Vlll PREFACE. 

picture, like a mock rainbow, is but the reflec- 
tion of a reflection. But every single character 
• in Shakspeare, is as much an individual, as those 
in life itself; it is as impossible to find any two 
alike ; and such, as from their relation or affi- 
nity in any respect appear most to be twins, 
will, upon comparison, be found remarkably 
distinct. To Ihis life and variety of character, 
we must add the wonderful preservation of it ; 
which is such throughout his plays, that had 
all the speeches been printed without the very 
names of the persons, I believe one might have 
applied them with certainty to every speaker." 
The object of the volume here offered to the 
publick, is to illustrate these remarks in a more 
particular manner by a reference to each play. 
A gentleman by the name of Mason, the au- 
thor of a Treatise on Ornamental Gardening, 
(not Mason the poet) began a work of a similar 
kind about forty years ago, but he only lived to 
finish a parallel between the characters of Mac- 
beth and Richard III., which is an exceedingly 
ingenious piece of analytical criticism. Rich- 
ardson's Essays include but a few of Shak- 
speare's principal characters. The only work 
which see'ued to snpersede the necessity of an 
attempt liLe the present was Schlegel's very 
admirable Lectures on the Drama, which give 
by far the best account of the plays of Shak- 
speare that has hitherto appeared. The only 



PREFACE. IX 

circumstances in which it was thought not im- 
possible to improve on the manner in which the 
German critick has executed this part of his de- 
sign, were in avoiding an appearance of mysti- 
cism in his style, not very attractive to the 
English reader, and in bringing illustrations from 
particular passages of the plays themselves, of 
which SchlegePs work, from the extensiveness 
of his plan, did not admit. We will at the same 
time confess, that some little jealousy of the 
character of the national understanding was not 
without its share in producing the following 
undertaking, for " we are piqued" that it 
should be reserved for a foreign critick to give 
" reasons for the faith which we English have 
in Shakspeare." Certainly, no writer among 
ourselves has shewn either the same enthusias- 
tick admiration of his genius, or the same philo- 
sophical acuteness in pointing out his charac- 
teristick excellencies. As we have pretty well 
exhausted all we had to say upon this subject 
in the body of the work, we shall here tran- 
scribe Schlegel's general account of Shak- 
speare, which is in the following words : — 

" Never, perhaps, was there so comprehensive 
a talent for the delineation of character as Shak- 
speare's. It not only grasps the diversities of 
rank, sex, and age, down to the dawnings of 
infancy ; not only do the king and the beggarj 



X " PREFACE. 

the hero and the pickpocket, the sage and the 
idiot speak and act with equal truth ; not only 
does he transport himself to distant ages and 
foreign nations, and pourtray in the most accu- 
rate manner, with only a few apparent violations 
of costume, the spirit of the ancient Romans, of 
the French in their wars with the English, of 
the English themselves during a great part of 
their history, of the Southern Europeans (in 
the serious part of many comedies) the culti- 
vated society of that time, and the former rude 
and barbarous state of the North ; his human 
characters have not only such depth and pre- 
cision that they cannot be arranged under classes, 
and are inexhaustible, even in conception : — no 
— this Prometheus not merely forms men, he 
opens the gates of the magical world of spirits ; 
calls up the midnight ghost ; exhibits before us 
his witches amidst their unhallowed mysteries ; 
peoples the air with sportive fairies and sylphs : 
— and these beings, existing only in imagination, 
possess such truth and consistency, that even 
when deformed monsters like Caliban, he extorts 
the conviction, that if there should be such be- 
ings, they would so conduct themselves. In a 
word, as he carries with him the most fruitful 
and daring fancy into the kingdom of nature, — 
on the other hand, he carries nature into the re- 
gions of fancy, lying beyond the confines of real- 



PREFACE. XI 

ity- We are lost in astonishment atseeing the 
extraordinarj, the wonderful, and the unheard 
of, in such intimate nearness. 

" If Shakspeare deserves our admiration for 
his characters, he is equally deserving of it for 
his exhibition of passion, taking this word in its 
widest signification, as including every mental 
condition, every tone, from indifference or fami- 
liar mirth to the wildest rage and despair. He 
gives us the history of minds ; he lays open to 
us, in a single word, a whole series of preceding 
conditions. His passions do not at first stand 
displayed to us in all their height, as is the case 
with so many tragick poets, who, in the language 
of Lessing, are thorough masters of the legal 
style of love. He paints, in a most inimitable 
manner, the gradual progress from the first ori- 
gin. * He gives,' as Lessing says, * a living 
picture of all the most minute and secret arti- 
fices by which a feeling steals into our souls ; of 
all the imperceptible advantages which it there 
gains ; of all the stratagems by which every other 
passion is made subservient to if, till it becomes 
the sole tyrant of our desires and our aversions.' 
Of all poets, perhaps, he alone has pourtrayed 
the mental diseases, melancholy, delirium, lu- 
nacy, with such inexpressible, and, in every re- 
spect, definite truth, that the physician may 
enrich his observatious from them in the same 
manner as from real cases. 



Xll PREFACE. 

" And yet Johnson has objected to Shak- 
speare, that his pathos is not alwajs natural and 
free from affectation. There are, it is true, pas- 
sages, though, comparatively speaking, very (ew, 
where his poetry exceeds the bounds of true 
dialogue, where a too soaring imagination, a too 
luxmiunl wit, rendered the complete dramatick 
forgetfulness of himself impossible. With (his 
exceplion, the censure originales only in a fan- 
ciless way of thinking^, lo which every thing ap- 
pears unnatural that does not suit ils own tame 
insipidity. Hence, an idea has been formed of 
simple and natural pathos, which consists in ex- 
clamations destitute of imagery, and nowise 
elevated above every-day life. But energetical 
passions electrify the whole of the mental 
powers, and will, consequently, in highly fa- 
voured natures, express themselves in an inge- 
nious and figurative manner. It has been often 
remarked, that indignation gives wit; and, as 
despair occasionally breaks out into laughter, it 
may sometimes also give vent to itself in anti- 
thetical comparisons. 

*' Besides, the rights of the poetical form have 
not been duly weighed. Shakspeare, who was 
always sure of his object, to move in a suffi- 
ciently powerful manner when he wished to do 
so, has occasionally, by indulging in a freer play, 
purposely moderated the impressions when too 
painful, and immediately introduced a musical 



PREFACE. Xlll 

alleviation of our sympathy. He had not those 
rude ideas of his art which many moderns seem 
to have, as if the poet, like the clown in the pro- 
verb, must strike twice on the same place. An 
ancient rhetorician delivered a caution against 
dwelling too long on the excitation of pity ; for 
nothing, he said, dries so soon as tears ; and 
Shakspeare acted conformably to this ingenious 
maxim, without knowing it. 

" The objection, that Shakspeare wounds our 
feelings by the open display of the most disgust- 
ing moral odiousness, harrows up the mind un- 
mercifully, and tortures even our senses by the 
exhibition of the most insupportable and hateful 
spectacles, is one of much greater importance. 
He has never, in fact, varnished over wild and 
blood-thirsty passions with a pleasing exterior, — 
never clothed crime and want of principle with 
a false show of greatness of soul ; and in that 
respect he is every way deserving of praise. 
Twice he has pourtrayed downright villains ; and 
the masterly way in which he has contrived to 
elude impressions of too painful a nature, may 
be seen in lago and Richard the Third. The 
constant reference to a petty and puny race mugt 
cripple the boldness of the poet. Fortunately 
for his art, Shakspeare lived in an age extremely 
susceptible of noble and tender impressions, but 
which had still enough of the firmness inherited 
from a vigorous olden time, not to shrink back 
2 



XIV PREFACE. 

with dismay from every strong and violent pic- 
ture. We have lived to see tragedies of which 
the catastrophe consists in the swoon of an ena- 
moured princess. If Shakspeare falls occasion- 
ally into the opposite extreme, it is a noble er- 
rour, originating in the fulness of a gigantick, 
strength : and yet this tragical Titan, who storms 
the heavens, and threatens to tear the world 
from off its hinges ; who, more terrible than 
^schylus, makes our hair stand on end, and 
congeals our blood with horrour, possessed, at the 
same time, the insinuating loveliness of the 
sweetest poetry. He plays with love like a 
child ; and his songs are breathed out like melt- 
ing sighs. He unites in his genius the utmost 
elevation and the utmost depth ; and the most 
foreign, and even apparently irreconcileable pro- 
perties subsist in him peaceably together. The 
world of spirits and nature have laid all their 
treasures at his feet. In strength a demi-god, 
in profundity of view a prophet, in all-seeing 
wisdom a protecting spirit of a higher order, he 
lowers himself to mortals, as if unconscious of 
his superiority : and is as open and unassjuraing 
as a child. 

«' Shakspeare's comick talent is equally won- 
derful with that which he has shown in the 
pathetick and tragick: it stands on an equal eleva- 
tion, and possesses equal extent and profundity. 
All that I before wished was, not to admit that 



PREFACE. XV 

the former preponderated. He is highly in- 
ventive in comick situations and motives. It will 
be hardly possible to show whence he has taken 
any of them ; whereas, in the serious part of his 
drama, he has generally laid hold of something 
already known. His comick characters are 
equally true, various, and profound, with his se- 
rious. So little is he disposed to caricature, that 
we may rather say many of his traits are almost 
too nice and delicate for the stage, that they can 
only be properly seized by a great actor, and 
fully understood by a ^ery acute audience. Not 
only has he delineated many kinds of folly ; he 
has also contrived to exhibit mere stupidity 
in a most diverting and entertaining manner." 
Vol. ii. p. 145. 

We have the rather availed ourselves of this 
testimony of a foreign critick in behalf of Shak- 
speare, because our own countryman. Dr. John- 
son, has not been so favourable to him. It may 
be said of Shakspeare, that " those who are not 
for him are against him :" for indifference is here 
the height of injustice. We may sometimes, in 
order *' to do a great right, do a little wrong." 
An overstrained enthusiasm is more pardonable 
with respect to Shakspeare than the want of it > 
for our admiration cannot easily surpass his 
genius. We have a high respect for Dr. John, 
son's character and understanding, mixed with 
something like personal attachment : but he was 



XVI PREFACE. 

neither a poet nor a judge of poetry. He might 
in one sense be a judge of poetry as it falls with- 
in the limits and rules of prose, but not as it is 
poetry. Least of all was he qualified to be a 
judge of Shakspeare, who " alone is high fan- 
tastical.** Let those who have a prejudice 
against Johnson read Boswell's Life of him : as 
those whom he has prejudiced against Shak- 
speare should read his Irene. We do not say 
that a man to be a critick must necessarily be a 
poet : but to be a good critick, he ought not to 
be a bad poet. Such poetry as a man delibe- 
rately writes, such, and such only will he like. 
Dr. Johnson's Preface to his edition of Shak- 
speare looks like a laborious attempt to bury the 
characteristick merits of his author under a load 
of cumbrous phraseology, and to weigh his excel- 
lencies and defects in equal scales, stuffed full 
of " swelling figures and sonorous epithets." 
Nor could it well be otherwise ; Dr. John- 
son's general powers of reasoning overlaid his 
critical susceptibility. All his ideas were cast 
in a given mould, in a set form : they were 
made out by rule -and system, by climax, in- 
ference, and antithesis : — Sbakspeare's were the 
reverse. Johnson's understanding dealt on- 
ly in round numbers : the fractions were lost 
upon him. He reduced every thing to the com- 
mon standard of conventional propriety ; and 
the most exquisite refinement or sublimity pro^ 



PREFACE. XVll 

diiced an effect on his mind, only as ihey could 
be translated into the language of measured prose. 
To him an excess of beauty was a fault ; for it 
appeared to him like an excrescence ; and his 
imagination was dazzled by the blaze of light. 
His writings neither shone with the beams of 
native genius, nor reflected them. The shift- 
ing shapes of fancy, the raiebow hues of things, 
made no impression on him ; he seized only on 
the permanent and tangible. He had no idea 
of natural objects but " such as he could mea- 
sure with a two-foot rule, or tell upon ten fin- 
gers :" he judged of human nature in the same 
way, by mood and figure : he saw only the defi- 
nite, the posilive, and the practical, the average 
forms of things, not their striking differences, 
their classes, not their degrees. He was a 
man of strong common sense and practical wis- 
dom, rather than of genius and feeling. He 
retained the regular, habitual impressions of 
actual objects, but he could not follow the rapid 
flights of fancy, or the strong movements of pas- 
sion. That is, he was to the poet what the 
painter of still life is to the painter of history. 
Common sense sympathizes with the impres- 
sions of things on ordinary minds in ordinary 
circumstances: genius catches the glancing com- 
binations presented to the eye of fancy, under 
the influence of passion. It is the province of 
the didactick reasoner to fake cognizance of those 

9 # 



XVlil PREFACE, 

results of human nature which are constantly 
repeated and always the same, which follow 
one another in regular succession, which are 
acted upon by large classes of men, and embodi- 
ed in received customs, laws, language, and in- 
stitutions ; an^d it was in arranging, comparing, 
and arguing on these kinds of general results, that 
J.ohnson's excellence lay. But he could not 
quit his hold of the common place and mecha- 
nical, and apply the general rule to the particular 
exception, or shew how the nature of man was 
modified by the workings of passion, or the 
infinite fluctuations of thought and accident. 
Hence he could judge neither of the heights nor 
depths of poetry. Nor is this all; for being 
conscious of great powers in himself, and those 
powers of an adverse tendency to those of his 
author, he would be for setting up a foreign ju- 
risdiction over poetry, and making criticism a 
kind of Procrustes' bed of genius, where he 
might cut down imagination , to matter of fact, 
regulate the passions according to reason, and 
translate the whole into logical diagrams and 
rhetorical declamation. Thus he says of Shak- 
speare's characters, in contradiction to what Pope 
had observed, and to what every one else feels, 
that each character is a species instead of being 
an individual. He in fact found the general 
species or didactick form in Shakspeare's charac- 
ters, which was all be sought or cared for; he 



PREFACE,. XIX 

did not find the individual traits, or the dramatick 
distinctions which Shakspeare has engrafted 
on this general nature, because he felt no in- 
terest in them. Shakspeare's bold and happy 
flights of imagination were equally thrown away 
upon our author. H§ was not only without 
any. particular fineness of organick sensibility, 
alive to all the " mighty world of ear and eye," 
which is necessary to the painter or musician, 
but without that intenseness of passion which, 
seeking to exaggerate whatever excites the feel- 
ings of pleasure or power in the mind, and 
moulding the impressions of natural objects ac- 
cording to the impulses of imagination, produces 
a genius and a taste for poetry. According to 
Dr. Johnson, a mountain is sublime, or a rose is 
beautiful ; for that their name and definition im- 
ply. But he would no more be able to give the 
description of Dover cliff in Lear, or the de- 
scription of flowers in The Winter^s Tale, than 
to describe the objects of a sixth sense ; nor 
do we think he would have any very profound 
feeling of the beauty of the passages here re- 
ferred to. A stately common place, such a& 
Congreve's description of a ruin in the Mourn- 
ing Bride, would have answered Johnson's pur- 
pose just as well, or better than the first ; and 
an indiscriminate profusion of scents and hues 
would have interfered less with the ordinary 



r*. 



XX PREFACE. 

routine of his imagination than Perdita's lines, 
which seem enamoured of their own sweet- 
ness — 

" Daffodils 

That come before the swallow dares, and take 
The winds of March with beauty ; violets dim, 
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes, 
Or Cytherea's breath." — 

No one who does not feel the passion which 
these objects inspire can go along with the ima- 
gination which seeks to express that passion and 
the uneasy sense of delight by something still 
more beautiful, and no one can feel this pas- 
sionate love of nature without quick natural 
sensibility. To a mere literal and formal ap- 
prehension, the inimitably characteristick epithet, 
" violets dim,'' must seem lo imply a defect, 
rather than a beauty ; and to any one, not feel- 
ing the full force of that epithet, which suggests 
an image like " the sleepy eye of love," the al- 
lusion to *' the lids of Juno's eyes" must appear 
extravagant and unmeaning. Shakspeare's fancy 
lent words and images to the most refined 
sensibility to nature, struggling for expression : 
bis descriptions are identical with the things 
themselves, seen through the fine medium of 
passion : strij) Ihem of that connexion, and try 
them by ordinary conceptions and ordinary rules, 
and they are as grotesc^ue and barbarous as 



PREFACE. XXI 

you please. — By thus lowering Shakspeare's 
genius to the standard of common place inven- 
tion, it was easy to shew that his faults were 
as great as his beauties : for the excellence, 
which consists merely in a conformity to rules, 
is counterbalanced by the technical violation of 
them. Another circumstance which led to Dr. 
Johnson's indiscriminate praise or censure of 
Shakspeare, is the very structure of his style.^ 
Johnson wrote a kind of rhyming prose, in which 
he was compelled as much to finish the different 
clauses of his sentences, and to balance one pe- 
riod against another, as the writer of heroick verse 
is to keep to lines of ten syllables with similar 
terminations. He no sooner acknowledges the 
merits of his author in one line than the periodi- 
cal revolution of his style carries the weight of 
his opinion completely over to the side of objec- 
tion, thus keeping up a perpetual alternation of 
perfections and absurdities. We do not other- 
wise know how to account for such assertions as 
the following: — *' In his tragick scenes, there is 
always something wanting, but his comedy often 
surpa&ses expectation or desire. His comedy 
pleases by the thoughts and the language, and 
his tragedy, for the greater part, by incident and 
action. His tragedy seems to be skill, his co- 
medy to be instinct." Yet after saying that 
*' his tragedy was skill,'* he affirms in the next 



XXll PREFACE. 

page, " His declamations or set speeches are 
commonly cold and weak, for his power was 
the power of nature: when he endeavoured, 
like other tragick writers, to catch opportunities 
of amplification, and instead of inquiring what 
the occasion demanded, to shew how much his 
stores of knowledge could supply, he seldom 
escapes without the pity or resentment of his 
reader." Poor Shakspeare ! Between the 
charges here brought against him, of want of 
nature in the first instance, and of want of skill 
in the second, he could hardly escape being con- 
demned. And again, " But the admirers of this 
great poet have most reason to complain when 
he approaches nearest to his highest excellence, 
and seems fully resolved to sink them in dejec- 
tion, or mollify them with tender emotions by 
the fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, 
or the crosses of love. What he does best, he 
soon ceases to do. He no sooner begins to move 
than he counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, 
as they are rising in the mind, are checked and 
blasted by sudden frigidi<y." In all this, our 
critick seems more bent on maintaining the equi- 
librium of his style than the consistency or truth 
of his opinions. — If Dr. Johnson's opinion was 
right, the following observations on Shakspeare's 
Plays must be greatly exaggerated, if not ridi- 
culous. If he was wrong, what has been said 



PREFACE. XXllI 

may perhaps account for his being so, without 
detracting from his abilitj and judgment in other 
things. 

It is proper to add, that the account of the 
Midsummer Night^s Dream has appeared in 
another work. 



April 15, 1817. 



CYMBELINE, 



Cymbeltne is one of the most deliojhtful of Shak- 
speare's historical plays. It may be considered as a 
dramatick romance, in which the most striking parts 
of the story are thrown into (he form of a dialogue, 
and the intermediate circumstances are explained by 
the different speakers, as occasion renders it neces- 
sary. The action is less concentrated in conse- 
quence ; but the interest becomes more aerial and refin- 
ed from the principle of perspective introduced into 
the subject by the imaginary changes of scene as well 
as by the length of time it occupies. The reading of 
this play is like going a journey with some uncertain 
object at the end of it, and in which the suspense is 
kept up and heightened by the long intervals between 
each action. Though the events are scattered over 
such an extetit of surfacie, and relate to such a variety 
of characters, yet the links which bind the different 
interests of the story together are never entirely 
broken. The most straggling and seemingly casual 
incidents are contrived in such a manner as to lead 
at last to the most complete development of the 
catastrophe. The ease and conscious unconcern 
3 



26 CYMBELTNE. 

with which this is effected only makes the skill more 
wonderful. The business of the plot evidently 
thickens in the last act : the story moves forward 
with increasing; rapidity at every step ; its various 
ramifications are drawn from the most distant points 
to the same centre; the» principal characters are 
brought to<]:;ether, and placed in very critical situa- 
tions ; and the fate of almost every person in the 
drama is made to depend on the solution of a single 
circumstance — the answer of lachimo to the question 
of Imogen respecting the obtaining of the ring from 
Posthumus. Dr. Johnson is of opinion that Shak- 
speare was generally inattentive to the winding up 
of his plots. We think the contrary is true; and we 
might cite in proof of this remark not only the present 
play, but the conclusion of Lear, of Romeo and Juliet^ 
of Macbeth, of Othello, even of Hamlet, and of other 
plays of less moment, in which the last act is crowd- 
ed with decisive events brought about by natural 
and strikino; means. 

The pathos in Cymbeline is not violent or tragi- 
cal, but of the most pleasing and amiable kind. A 
certain tender gloom o'erspreads the whole. Posthu- 
mus is the ostensible hero of the piece, but its greatest 
charm is the character of Imogen. Posthumus is 
only interesting from the interest she takes in him, 
and she is only interesting herself from her tenderness 
and constancy to her husband. It is the peculiar 
characteristick of Sliakspeare's heroines, that they 
seem to exist only in their attachment to others. 
They are pure abstractions of the affections. We 
think as little of their persons as they do themselves, 



CYMBETINE. 2? 

because we are let into the secrets of their hearts, 
which are more important. We are too much inter- 
ested in their affairs to stoj) to look at their faces, ex- 
cept by stealth and at intervals. No one ever hit 
the true perfection of the female character, the sense 
of weakness leaning on the strength of its affections 
for support, so well as Shaksjjeare — no one ever so 
well painted natural tenderness free from aflectalion 
and disguise — no one else ever so well shewed how 
delicacy and timidity, when driven to extremity, 
grow romantick and extravagant; for the romance 
of his heroines (in which they abound) is only an 
excess of the habitual prejudices of their sex, scrupu- 
lous of being false to their vows, truant to their afTec- 
tions, and taught by the force of feeling when to fore- 
go the forms of propriety for the essence of it. His 
women were in this respect exquisite logicians ; for 
there is nothing so logical as passion. They knew 
their own minds exactly ; and only followed up a fa- 
vourite idea, which they had sworn to with their 
tongues, and which was engraven on their hearts, 
into its untoward consequences. They were the 
prettiest little set of martyrs and confessors on re- 
cord. — Gibber, in speaking of the eariy English stage, 
accounts for the want of prominence and theatrical 
diSi)Iay in Shakspeare's female characters from the 
circumstance, that women in those days were not 
allowed to play the parts of women, which made it 
necessary to keep lh< m a good deal in the back- 
ground. Does not this state of manners itself, which 
prevented their exhibiting themselves in puhlick, 
and confined them to the relations and charities of 



28 CYMBELINE. 

domestick life, afford a truer explanation of the mat- 
ter ? His women are certainly very unlike stage 
heroines ; the reverse of tragedy queens. 

We have almost as great an atfection for Imogen 
as she had for Posthumus; and she deserves it better. 
Of all Shakspeare's women she is perhaps the most 
tender and the most artless. Her incredulity in the 
opening scene with lachimo, as to her husband's infi- 
delity, is much the same as Uesdemona's backwardness 
to believe Othello's jealousy. Her answer to the most 
distressing part of the picture is only, " My lord, 1 fear 
has forgot Britain." Her readiness to pardon lachi- 
mo's false imputations and his designs against herself, 
is a good lesson to prudes ; and may shew that where 
there is a real attachment to virtue, it has no need to 
bolster itself up with an outrageous or affected anti- 
pathy to vice. The scene in which Pisanio gives Imo- 
gen his master's letter,accusing her of incontinency on 
the treacherous suggestions of lachimo, is as touching 
as it is possible for any thing to be : — 

" Pisanio. What cheer, Madam ? 

Imogen. False to his bed ! What is It to be false ? 
To lie in watch there, and to think on him ? 
To weep 'twixt clock and clock ? If sleep charge nature, 
To break it with a fearful dream of him, 
And cry myself awake i' That's false to's bed, is it ? 

Fisonio. Alas, good lady ! 

Imogen. I false ? thy conscience witness, lachimo^ 
Thou didst accuse him of incontinency, 
Thou then lookMst like a villain : now methinks, 
Thy favour's j^ood enough. Some Jay of Italy, 
Whose molber was her painting, hath betrayed him : 
■poor I am stale, a garment out of fashioUi 



CYMBELINE. 29 

And for I am richer than to hang by th* walls, 

I nui.^t bt? iipt ; to pieces with me. Oh, 

Men's vows are women's traitors. All good seeming 

By thy revolt, oh hnsband, shall be thonght 

Put on for villany : not born where't grows, 

But worn a bait for ladies. 

Pisanio. Good Vladam, hear me — 

Imogen. Talk thy tongue weary, speak : 
I have heard 1 am a strumpet, and mine ear, 
Therein false struck, can take no greater wound. 
Nor tput to bottom that." 

When Pisanio, who had been charged to kill his 
mistress, puts her in a way to live, she says, 

" Why, good fellow. 
What shall 1 do tlie while .f» Where bide ? How live ? 
Or in my life what comfort, when I am 
Dead to my husband !^' 

Yet when he advises her to disguise herself in 
boy's clothes, and suggests " a course pretty and full 
in view," by which she may *' hnppily be near the 
residence of Posthumus," she exclaims, 

" Oh, for such means, 
Though peril to my modesty, not death on't, 
I would adventure." 

And when Pisanio, enlarging on the consequences, 
tells her she must change 



— " Fear and niceness, 



The handmaids of all women, or more truly, 
W^oman its pretty self, into a waggish courage. 
Ready in gibes, quick answer'd, saucy, and 
As quarrellous as the weazel" — . 

she interrupts him hastily : — 
3* 



30 CYMBELINE. 

" Nay, be brief; 
I see into thy end, and am almost 
A man already." 

In her journey thus diss^uised (o Milford-HaveD^ 
she loses her guide and her wny ; and unbosoming 
her complaints, says beautifully, — 

" My dear Lord. 



Thou art one of the fti-Jse ones ; now I think on thee, 
My hunger's gone ; but even before, I was 
At point to sink for food." 

She afterwards finds, as she thinks^ the dead body 
of Posthumus, and engages herself as a footboy to 
serve a Roman officer, when she has done all due 
obsequies to him whom she calls her former master — ■ 

" And when 

With wild wood leaves and weeds I ha' strew 'd his grave, 

And ou it said a century of pray'rs, 

Such as I can, twice oVr, I'll weep and sigh, 

And leaving so his service, follow you, 

!So please you entertain me." 

Now this is the very religion of ]ove. She all 
along relies little on ber personal charms, which she 
fears may have been eclipsed by some painted Jay 
of Italy ; she relies on her merit, and her merit is in 
the depth of her love, her truth and constancy. Oiiv 
admiration of her beauty is excited with as little 
consciousness as possible on her part. There are 
two delicious descriptions given of her, one when she 
is asleep, and one when she is supposed dead. Arvi- 
rasus thus addresses her— 



With fairest fiowerst, 



While summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele, 



CYMBELIIVE. 31 

I'll svrepten thy sad grave ; thou slialt not lack 
The flo^v^'r that's like tiiy fatp, p;ile primrose, nor 
The aziu'd hare beli, like thy veins, no, uor 
The leaf of eglaniine, which not to slander, 
Out-sweeteu'd not thy breath." 

The yeUow lachimo gives another thus, when he 
steals into her t)edchamber : — 

'^ Cytherea, 

How bravely thou becom'st thy bed ! Fresh lily, 
And whiter than the sheets ! That [ night touch — 
But kiss, one kiss- ' Fis her breathing that 
Perfumes the chamber thus : the flame o' th' taper 
Bows towards her, and would under peep her lids 
To see th' enclosed lights now canopied 
Under the windows, white and azure, laced 
With blue of Heav'ns own tinct — on her left breast 
A mole cinque spotted, like the crimson drops 
I' the bottom of a cowslip." 

There is a mora! sense in the proud beauty of this 
last image, a rich surfeit of the fancy, — as that weii 
known passage beginning, " Me of my la^vful pleasure 
she restrained, and prayed me oft forbearance, 'sets a 
keener e('ge tipon it by the inimitable picture of mo- 
desty and self-denial. 

The character of Cloten, the conceited, booby lord, 
and rejected lover of Imogen, though not very agree- 
able in itself, and at present obsolete, is drawn with 
great humour and knowledge of character. The 
description which Imogen gives of his unwelcome 
addresses to her — '"■ Whose lovesuit hath been to me 
as fearful as a siege" — is enough to cure the most 
ridiculous lover of his folly. It is remarka!>!e (hat 
though Cloten makes so poor a figure in love, he is 



32 CYMBELINE. 

described as assuming an air of consequence as the 
Qi.eerj's son in a council of s(Mle, nnd wiih al! the 
absurdity of his person and minuers, is not without 
shrewdness in his observations. So true is it that 
folly is as often owing to a v\Mnt of proper sentiments 
as to a want of understanding ! The exclamation of 
the p.ncient criiick, Oh Menanderand Nature, which 
of you copied from the other ! would not be misappli- 
ed to Shakspeare. 

The other chiracters in this play are represented 
with great truth and accuracy, and as it happens in 
most of the author's works, there is not only the ut- 
most keepins in each separate character; but in the 
casting or the different parts and their relation to one 
another, there is an affinity and harmony, like what we 
m^y observe in the o;radations of colour in a |-icture. 
The striking and powerful contrasts in which Shak- 
speare abounds could not escape observation ; but 
the use he mikes of the princijile of analogy to recon- 
cile the greatest diversities of character and to main- 
tain a continuity of feeling throughout, has not been 
sufficiently attended to. In Cymbeline, for instance, 
the principal interest arises out of the unalterable 
fidelity of Imosjen to her husband under the most 
trying circumstances. Now the other parts of the 
picture are fiiled up with subonlinate examples of the 
same feeling, variously modified by diiferent situa- 
tions, and applied to the purposes of virtue or vice. 
The plot is aided by the amorous importunities of 
Cloten, by the tragical determination of lachmo to 
conceal the defeat of his project by a daring impos- 
ture : the faithful attachment of Fisanio to his mistress 



CYMBELINE. 33 

is an affecting accompaniment to the whole ; the 
obstinate adherence to his purpose in Bellarius, who 
keeps the fate of the young princes so long a secret 
in resentment for the ungrateful return to his former 
services, the incorrigible wickedness of the Queen, 
and even tiie blind uxorious confidence of Cymbe- 
liue, are all so many lines of the same story, tending 
to the same point. The effect of this coincidence is 
rather felt than observed; and as the impression 
exists unconsciously in the mind of the reader, so it 
probably arose in the same manner in the mind of 
the author, not from design, but from the force of 
natural association, a particular train of feeling sug- 
gesting different inflections of the same predominant 
principle, melting into, and strengthening one another, 
like chords in musick. 

The characters of Bellarius, Guiderius, and Arvi- 
ragus, and the romantick scenes in which they ap- 
pear, are a fine relief to the intrigues and artificial 
refinements of the court from which they are banish- 
ed. Nothing can surpass the wildness and simplici- 
ty of the descriptions of the mountain life they lead. 
They follow the business of huntsmen, not of shep- 
herds ; and this is in keeping with the s[)irit of 
adventure and uncertainty in the rest of the story, 
and with the scenes in which they are afterwards 
called on to act. How admirably the youthful fire 
and impatience to emerge from their obscurity in 
the young princes is opposed to the cooler calcula- 
tions and prudeut ress:<fKitio<i ot tht^ir m'>re experienc- 
ed counsellor ! How well the disadvantages of 



34 CYMBELINE. 

knowledge and of ignorance, of solitude and society, 
are placed against each other ! 

" Guidtrius. Out of your proof you speak : we poor unfledg'd 
Have never wing'd from view o' th' nest ; nor know not 
What air's from home. Haply this life is best, 
If quiet life is best ; sweeter to you 
F That have a sharprr known ; well corresponding 

, i ~ With your stiff age : but unto us it is 

®^* A cell of ignorance ; travelling a- bed, 

A prison for a debtor, that not dares 
^ To stride a limit. 

• Arviragus. What should we speak of 

When we are old as you? When we shall hear 
The rain and wind beat dark December ! How, 
^ In this our pinching care, shall we discourse 

V The freezing hours away ? We hnve seen nothing. 

We are beastly j subtle as the fox for prey. 
Like warlike as the wolf for what we eat : 
Our valour is to chase what flies ; our cage 
We make a quire, as doth the prison'd bird, 
^^ Aud sing our bondage freely." 

The answer of Beliarius to this expostulation is 
hardly satisfoctory ; for nothing can be an answer to 

:^ hope, or the passion of the m'ind<iR)r unknown good, 

' but experience. — The forest of Arden, in As you like 

itj can alone compare with ihe mountain scenes in 
Cymeel-ine: yet how dirferent the contemplative 
quiet of the one from the enterprising bohlness and 

^. precarious mode of subsistence in the other ! Shak- 

speare not only lets us into the minds of his charac- 
ters, but gives a tone and colour to the scenes he 
describes from the feelings of their imaginary inhabi- 

<y tanls. He at the same time preserves the utmost 



CYMBELINE. 35 

propriety of action and passion, and gives all their 
local accompaniments. If he was equal to the 
greatest things, he was not above an attention to the 
smallest. Thus the gallant sportsmen in CymbelTine 
have to encounter the abrupt declivities of hill 
and valley : Touchstone and Audrey jog along a 
level path. The deer in Cymbeli ne are only regard- 
ed as objects of prey, " The game's a-foot," &c. — 
with Jaques they are fine subjecis to moralize upon 
at leisure, "under the shade of melancholy boughs." 
We cannot take leave of this play, which is a fa- 
vourite with us, without noticing some occasional 
touches of natural piety and morality. We may 
allude here to the opening of the scene in which 
Bellarius instructs the young princes to pay their ori- 
sons to heaven : 

" See, Boys ! this gate , 



Instructs you how t' adore the Heav'ns ; and bows you 
To morning's holy office. 

Guiderius. Hail, Heav'n ! 

Arvirngus. Hail, Heav'n ! 

Bellarius. Now for our mountain sport, up to yon hill." 

What a grace and unaffected spirit of ()iety breathes 
in this passage ! In like manner, one of the brothers 
says to the other, when about to perform the funeral 
rites to Fidele, 

" Nay, Cadwall, we must lay his head to the east ; 
My Father hath a reason for't." 

Shakspeare's morality is introduced in the same 
simple, unobtrusive manner. Imogen will not let 



36 CYMBELINE. 

her companions stay away from the chase to attend 
her when sick, and gives her reason for it — 

" Stick to your journal course ; the breach of custom 
Is breach of all /" 

When the Queen attempts to disguise her motives 
for procuring the poison from Cornelius, by saying 
she means to try its etfects on " creatures not worth 
the hanging," his answer conveys at once a tacit 
reproof of her hypocrisy, and a useful lesson of hu- 
manity — 



— " Your Highness 



Shall from this practice but make hard your heart. 



MACBETH. 



*' The poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling 

Doth glance from heaven to ea.th, from earth to heaven ; 

And as imagination bodies forth 

The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen 

Turns them to shape, and gives to airy nothing 

A local habitation and a name." 

Macbeth and Lear, Othello aud Hamlet, are usually 
reckoned Shakspeare's four principal tragedies. Lear 
stands first for the profound intensity of the passion ; 
Macbeth for the wildness of the imd^ination and the 
rapidity of the action ; Othello for the (>rogressive in- 
terest and powerful alternations of feeling; Hamlet 
for the retined development of thought and senti- 
ment. If the force of genius shewn in each of these 
works is astonishing, their variety is not less so. 
They are like ditferent creations of the same mind, 
not one of which has the slightest reference to the 
rest. This distinctness and originality is indeed the 
necessary consequence of truth and nature. Shak- 
speare's genius alone appeared to possess the re- 
sources of nature. He is "your only tragedy-maker.^'' 
His plays have the force of things upon the mind. 



3B MACBETH. 

What he represents is brought home to the bosom as 
a part of our experience, implanted in the memory as 
if we had kno^n the places, persons, and things of 
which he treats. Macbeth is like a record of a pre- 
ternatural and tragical event. It has the rugged se- 
verity of an old chronicle, with all that the imagina- 
tion of the poet can engraft upon traditional belief. 
The castle of Macbeth, round which " the air smells 
wooiogly," and where "the temple-haunting martlet 
buiids,"has a real subsistence in the mind ; the Weird 
Sisters meet us in person on " the blasted heath ;" the 
« air-drawn dagger" moves slowly before our eyes ; 
the ''gracious Duncan," the " blood-boultered Ban- 
quo" stand before us; all that passed through the 
mind of Macbeth passes, without the loss of a tittle, 
through ours. All that could actually take place, and 
all that is only possible to be conceived, what was said 
and what was done, the workings of passion, the spells 
Of magick, are brought before us with the same abso- 
lute truth and vividness.— Shakspeare excelled in the 
openings of his plays : that of Macbeth is the most 
striking of any. The wildness of the scenery, the 
sudden shifting of the situations and characters, the 
bustle, the expectations excited, are equally extraor- 
dinary. From ibe tirst entrance of the Witches and 
the description of them when they meet Macbeth, 

" Wliat are these 



So wither'd and so wild in their attire, 

That look not like the inhabitants of th' earth 

And yet are on't p" 

the mind is prepared for all that follows. 



MACBETH. 39 

This tragedy is alike distinguished for the lofty 
imagination it displays, and for the tumultuous vehe- 
mence of the action ; and the one is made the 
moving principle of the other. The overwhelming 
pressure of preternatural agency urges on the tide of 
human passion with redoubled force. Macbeth him- 
self appears driven along by the violence of his fate, 
like a vessel drifting before a storm ; he reels to and 
fro like a drunken man ; he staggers under the 
weight of his own purposes and the suggestions of 
others ; he stands at bay with his situation ; and, from 
the superstitious awe and breathless suspense into 
which the communications of the Weird Sisters throw 
him. is hurried on with daring impatience to verify 
their predictions, and with impious and bloody hand to 
tear aside the veil which hides the uncertainty of the 
future. He is not equal to the struggle with fate and 
conscience. He now " bends up each corporal 
instrument to the terrible feat;" at other times his 
heart misgives him, and he is cowed and abashed by 
his success. " The deed, no less than the attempt, 
confounds him," His mind is assailed by the stings 
of remorse, and full of "■ preternatural solicitings." 
His speeches and soliloquies are dark riddles on 
human life, baffling solution, and entangling him in 
their labyrinths. In thought he is absent and per- 
plexed, sudden and desperate in act, from a distrust 
of his own resolutit)n. His energy springs from the 
anxiety and agitation of his mind. His blindly rush- 
ing fv)rward on the oltjecls of his ambition and 
revenge, or his recoiling from them, equally betrays 
the harassed state of his feelings. — This part of his 



40 MACBETH. 

character is admirably set off by being brought iu 
connexion with that of Lady Macbeth, whose obdu- 
rate strength of will and masculine firmness give her 
the ascendancy over her husband's fauitering virtue. 
She at once seizes on the opportunity that offers for 
the accorajdishment of all their wished for greatness, 
and never flinches from her object till all is over. 
The magnitude of her resolution almost covers the 
magnitude of her guilt. She is a great, bad woman, 
whom we hate, but whom we fear more than we hate. 
She does not excite our loathing and abhorrence like 
Regan and Gonerill. She is only wicked to gain a 
great end ; and is perhaps more distinguished by her 
commanding presence of mind and inexorable self- 
will, which do not suffer her to be diverted from a 
bad purpose, when once formed, by weak and wo- 
manly regrets, than by the hardness of her heart or 
want of natural affections. The impression, which 
her loffy deteimination of character makes on the 
mind of Macbeth, is well described where he ex- 
claims, 

" Bring forth men children only j 



For thy undaunted mettle should compose 
INothing but males !" 

Nor do the pains she is at to " screw his courage to 
the sticking place,'* the- reproach to him, not to be 
" lost so poorly in himself," the assurance that " a 
little water clears them of this deed,*' shew any thing 
but her greater consistency in depravity. Her 
strong nerved ambition furnishes ribs of steel to **■ the 
sides of his intent ;" and she is herself wound up to 



MACBETH. 41 

the execution of her baneful project with the same 
unshrinking fortitude in crime, that in other circum- 
stiinces she would probably have shewn patience in 
suffering. The deliberate sacrilice of all other con- 
siderations to the gaining *' for their future days and 
nights, sole sovereign sway and mastercidm," by the 
murtier of Duncan, is gorgeously expressed in her 
invocation on hearing of " his fatal entrance under 
her battlements :" — 

. • " Come all you spirits 

That tend on mortal tiiouglits, iinsex me here : 
And fill me, from the crown to th' toe, top-full 
Of direst cruelty ; make thick my blood, 
Stop Dp the accesss and passage to remorse. 
That no compunctious visitings of nature 
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between 
The effect and it. Come to my woman's breasts, 
And take my milk for gall, you murthering ministers, 
Wherever in your sightless substances 
You wait on n iture's mischief. Come, thick night ! 
And pall thee in the duunest smoke of hell. 
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes, 
Nor heav'n peep through the blanket of the dark, 
To cry, hold, hold !"— 

Wlien she first hears that " Duncan comes there to 
sleep" she is so overcome by the news, which is 
beyond her utmost expectations, that she answers the 
messenger, " Thou'rt mad to say it :" and on receiv- 
ing her husband's account of the predictions of the 
Witches, conscious of his instability of purpose, and 
that her presence is necessary to goad him on to the 
consu.'U nation of his promised greatness, she ex- 
claims — 



42 MACBETH. 



-" Hie thee hither. 



That I may pour my spirits in thine ear, 
And cliastise with the valour of my tongue 
All that impedes tliee from the golden round, 
Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem 
To have thee crowned withal." 

This swelling exultation and keen spirit of triumpbj 
this uncontrolable eagerness of anticipation, which 
seems to dilate her form and take possession of all 
her faculties, this solid, substantial flesh and blood 
display of passion, exhibit a striking contrast to the 
cold, abstracted, gratuitous, servile malignity of the 
Witches, who are equally instrumental in urging 
Macbeth to his fate, for the mere love of mischief, 
and from a disinterested delight in deformity and 
cruelty. They are hags of mischief, obscene [>anders 
to iniquity, malicious from their impotence of enjoy- 
ment, enamoured of destruction, because they are 
themselves unreal, abortive, half existences, who be- 
come sublime from their exemption from all human 
sympathies and contempt for all human affairs, as 
Lady Macbeth does by the force of passion ! Her 
fault seems to have been an excess of that strong 
principle of self-interest and family aggrandisement, 
not amenable to the common feelings of compassion 
and justice, which is so marked a feature in barbarous 
nations and times. A passing reflection of this kind, 
on the resemblance of the sleeping king to her 
father, alone prevents her from slaying Duncan with 
her own hand. 

In speaking of the character of Lady Macbeth, we 
ought not to pass over Mrs. Siddoas's manner of 



MACBETH. 43 

acting that part. We can conceive of nothing grand- 
er. It was something above nature. It seemed 
almost as if a being of a superiour order had dropped 
from a higher sphere to awe the world with the ma- 
jesty of her appearance. Power was seated on her 
brow, passion emanated from her breast as from a 
shrine; she was tragedy personified. In comina; on 
in the sleeping scene, her eyes were open, but their 
sense was shut. She was like a person bewildered 
and unconscious of what she did. Her lips moved 
involuntarily — all her gestures were involuntary and 
mechanical. She glided on and off the stage like an 
apparition. To have seen her in that character was 
an event in every one's life, not to be forgotten. 

The draraatick beauty of (he character of Duncan, 
T^'hich excites the respect and pity even of his mur- 
derers, has been often pointed out. It forms a pic- 
ture of itself. An instance of the author's power of 
giving a striking effect to a common reflection, by 
the manner of introducing it, occurs in a speech of 
Duncan, complaining of his having been deceived in 
his opinion of the Thane of Cawdor, at the very 
moment that he is expressing the most unbounded 
confidence in the loyalty and services of Macbeth. 

" There is no art 
To find the mind's construction in the face : 
He was a gentleman, on whom I built 
An absolute trust. 

O worthiest cousin, {addressing himself to Macbeth) 

The sin of my ingratitude e'en now 
Was great upon me," &c. 

Another passage to shew that Shakspeare lost 
sight of nothing that could in any way give relief or 



44 MACBETH. 

heightening to his subject, is the conversation which 
takes place between Banquo and Fleance immtdi- 
ately before the murder scene of Duncan. 

" Bonquo How goes the night, boy ? 

Fleance. The inoon is down : I have not heard the clock, 

Banquo. And she goes down at twelve. 

Fleance. I take't, 'tis later, Sir. 

Banquo. Hold, take my sword. There's husbandry in heav'a, 
Their candles are all out. — 
A heavy summons lies like lead upon me. 
And yet 1 would not sleep : Merciful Powers, 
Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature 
Gives way to in repose." 

in like manner, a fine idea is given of the gloomy 
coming on of evening, just as Banquo is going to be 
assassinated. 

" liight thicken?, and the crow 
Makes wing to the rooky wood." 

•' NoTV spurs the lated traveller apace 
To gain the timely iwn." 

Macbeth (generally speaking) is done upon a 
stronger and more systemalick principle of contrast 
than any other of Shakspeare's plays. It moves up- 
on the verge of an abyss, and is a constant struggle 
between life and death. The action is desperate aud 
the reaction is dreadful. It is a huddling together of 
fierce extremes, a war of opposite natures which of 
them shall destroy the other. There is nothing but 
■what has a violent end or violent beginnings. The 
lights and shades are laid on with a determined hand ; 



MACBETH. 4B 

the transitions from triumph to despair, from the 
height of terrour to the repose of death, are sudden 
and startling ; every passion brings in its fellow- 
contrary, and the thoughts pitch and jostle against 
each other as in the dark. The whole play is an 
unruly chaos of strange and forbidden things, where 
the ground rocks under our feet. Shakspeare's genius 
here took its full swing, and trod upon the farthest 
bounds of nature and passion. This circumstance 
will account for the abruptness and violent antithe- 
ses of the style, the throes and labour which run 
through the expression, and from defects will turn 
them into beauties. " So fair and foul a day I have 
not seen," &c. " Such welcome and unwelcome 
news together." " Men's lives are like the fiowers 
in their caps, dying or ere they sicken." " Look 
like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under it." 
The scene before the castle gate follows the appear- 
ance of the Witches on the heath, and is followed by 
a midnight murder. Duncan is cut off betimes by 
treason leagued with witchcraft, and Macdufif is rip- 
ped untimely from his mother's womb to avenge his 
death. Macbeth, after the death of Banquo, wishes 
for his presence in extravagant terms, " To him 
and all we thirst," and when his ghost appears, cries 
out, " A vaunt and quit my. sight," and being gone, 
he is " himself again." Macbeth resolves to get rid 
of iVIacduif that " he may sleep in spite of thunder;" 
and cheers his wife on the doubtful intelligence of 
Banquo's taking otf, with the encouragement — " Then 
be thou jocund: ere the bat has t5own his cloistered 
flight; ere to black Hecate's summons the shard-bora 



46 MACBETH. 

beetle has rung night's yawning peal, there shall be 
done — a deed of dreadful note." In Lady Macbeth's 
speech " Had he not resembled my father as he slept, 
I had done 't," there is murder and filial piety to- 
gether, and in urging him to fulfil his vengeance' 
against the defenceless king, her thoughts spare the 
blood neither of infants nor old age. The descrip- 
tion of the Witches is full of the same contradictory 
principle; they *' rejoice when good kings hleed," 
they are neither of the earth nor the air, but both ; 
*' they should be women, but their beards forbid it ;" 
they take all the pains possible to lead Macbeth on 
to the height of his ambition, only to betray him in 
deeper consequence, and after shewing him all the 
pom{) of their art, discover their malignant delight in 
his disappointed ho{)es, by that bitter taunt, '' Why 
stands Macbeth thus amazediy ?" We might multiply 
such instances every where. 

The leading features in the character of Macbeth 
are striking enough, and they form what may be 
thought at first only a bold, rude, Gothick outline. 
By comparing it with other characters of the s^ime 
author, we shall perceive the absolute truth nnd iden- 
tity which is observed in the midst of the gi<idy whirl 
and rapid career of events. Macl-eth in Sbi)ks()eare 
no more loses his i<lentify of character in the fluctu- 
ations of fort:ine or the storm of passion, than Mac- 
beth in himsr If would have lost the identity of his 
person. Thus he is as distinct a being from Richard 
HI. as it is possiitle to imagine, though these two 
characters in common hands, and indeed in the hands 
ef any other poet, would have been a repetition of 



MACBETH. 47 

the same general idea, more or less exaggerated. 
For both are tyrants, usurpers, murderers, both as- 
piring and ami)itious, both courageous, cruel, treach- 
erous. But Richard is cruel from nature and con- 
stitution. Mncbeth becomes so from accidental cir- 
cumstances. Richard is from his birth deformed in 
body and mind, and naturally incapable of good. — 
Macl)eth is full of " the milk of human kindness," 
is fra!)k, sociable, generous. He is tempted to the 
commission of guilt by golden opportunities, bj^ the 
icsticjations of his wife, and by prophetick warnings. 
Fate and metaphysical aid conspire against his 
virtue and his loyalty. Richard, on the contrary, 
needs no prompter, but wa<les through a series of 
crimes to the height of his ambition from the un- 
governnble violence of his temper and a reckless 
love of mischief. He is never gay but in the pros- 
pect or in (he success of his villanies : Macbeth is 
ful! of horrour at the thoughts of the murder of Dun- 
can, which he is with difficulty ()revailed on to com- 
mit, and of remorse after its perpetration. Richard 
has no mixture of common humanity in his compo- 
sitioti, no regard to ?'indred or [)Osterity, he owns no 
fellowship with others, he is " himself alone." Mac- 
beth is not destitute of feelings of sj^npathy, is ac- 
cessible to pity, is even made in some measure the 
du[)e of his uxoriousness, ranks the loss of friends, 
of the cordial love of his followers, and of his good 
name, amo:ig the causes which have made him weary 
of life, and regrets thut he has ever seized the crown 
by u !J-.i3l means, since he cannot transmit it to his 
posterity — 



48 MACBETH. 

" For Banquo's issue have I 'fil'd my mind — 
For thera the gracious Duncan have I murther'd, 
To make them kings, the seed of Banquo kings." 

In the agitation of his thoughts, he envies those 
whom he has sent to peace. " Duncan is in his 
grave ; after life's (itful fever he sleeps well."— It is 
true, he becomes more callous as he plunges deeper 
in guilt, " direness is thus rendered familiar to his 
slaughterous thoughts," and he in the end anticipates 
his wife in the boldness and bloodiness of his enter- 
prises, while she for want of the same stimulus of 
action, is " troubled with thick coming fancies that 
rob her of her rest," goes mad and dies. Macbeth 
endeavours to escape from reflection on his crimes by 
repelling their consequences, and banishes remorse 
for the past by the meditation of future mischief. — 
This is not the principle of Richard's cruelty, which 
resembles the wanton malice of a fiend as much as 
the frailty of human passion. Macbeth is goaded on 
to acts of violence and retaliation by necessity ; to 
Richard, blood is a pastime. — There are other deci- 
sive differences inherent in the two characters. Rich- 
ard may be regarded as a man of the world, a plot- 
ting, hardened knave, wholly regardless of every 
thing but his own ends, and the means to secure them 
— Not so Macbeth. The superstitions of the age, 
the rude state of society, the local scenery and cus- 
toms, all give a wildness and imaginary grandeur to 
his character. From the strangeness of the events 
that surround him, he is full of amazement and fear; 
and stands in doubt between the world of reality and 
the world of fancy. He sees sights not shewn to 



MACBETH. 49 

mortal eye, and hears unearthly musick. All is 
tumult and disorder within and without his mind; 
his purposes recoil upon himself, are broken and dis- 
jointed ; he is the double thrall of his passions and 
his evil destiny. Richard is not a character either 
of imagination or pathos, but of pure self-will. 
There is no conflict of opposite feelings in his breast. 
The apparitions which he sees haunt him only in his 
sleep; nor does he live like Macbeth in a waking 
dream. Macbeth has considerable energy and man- 
liness of character ; but then he is "subject to all the 
skyey influences." tie is sure of nothing but the 
prv^'sent moment. Richard, in the busy turbulence 
of his projects, never loses his self- |}ossession, and 
makes use of every circumstance that happens as an 
instrument of his long reaching desij>:ns. In his last 
extremity can we only regard him as a wild beast 
taken in the toils ; we never entirely lose our 
concern for Mac!>eth; and he calls back nil our 
sytn,)athy by that fine close of thoughtful melan- 
choly, 

" My way of life is fallen into the sear. 

The yellow leaf; and that which s^hould accompany old age, 

As honour, troops of friends, I mnst not look lo have ; 

But in their stead, cjirses, not 'oud but dtep, 

Mouth honour, breath, which the poor heart 

Would fain deny, and dare not." 

We can conceive a common actor to play Richard 
tolerably well ; we can conceive no one to iday Mric- 
beth properly, or lo look like a man ihcu had 
encountered the \Vt ird Sisters. All the actors that 
we have ever seen, apptar as if they had encounter- 
5 



50 MACBETH. 

ed them on the boards of Covent-garden or Drury- 
lane, but not on the heath at Foris, and as if they 
did not believe what they had seen. The Witches 
of Macbeth indeed are ridiculous on the modern 
stage, and we doubt if the Furies of ^schylus would 
be more respected. The progress of manners and 
knowledge has an influence on the stage, and will in 
time perhaps destroy both tragedy and comedy. 
Filch's picking pockets in the Beggafs Opera is not 
so good a jest as it used to be : by the force of the po- 
lice and of philosophy, Lillo's murders and the ghosts 
in Shakspeare will become obsolete. At last, there 
w411 be nothing left, good nor bad, to be desired or 
dreaded, on the theatre or in real life. A question 
has been started with respect to the originality of 
Shakspeare's Witches, which has been well answer- 
ed by Mr Lamb in his notes to the '* Specimens of 
Early Dramatick PoetrJ^" 

*' Though some resemblance may be traced be- 
tween the charms in Macbeth, and the incantations 
in this play, (the Witch of Middleton) which is sup- 
posed to have preceded it, this coincidence will not 
detract much from the originality of Shakspeare. 
His Witches are distinguished from the AVitches of 
Middleton by essential differences. These are crea- 
tures to whom man or woman plotting some dire 
mischief might resort for occasional consultation. 
Those originate deeds of blood, and begin bad 
impulses to men. From the moment that their eyes 
first meet with Macbeth's he is spell bound. That 
meeting sways his destiny. He can never break the 
fascination. These Witches can hurt the body ; 



Mi^CBETH. 51 

those have power over the soul.— Hecate in Middle- 
ton has a son, a low buffoon : the hags of Sbakspeare 
have neither child of their own, nor seem to be de- 
scended from any parent. They are foul anomalies, 
of whom we know not whence they are sprung, nor 
whether they have beginning or ending. As they 
are without human passions, so they seem to be 
•without human relations. They come with thunder 
and lightning, and vanish to airy musick. This is 
all we know of them. — Except Hecate, they have no 
names, which heightens their mysteriousness. The 
names, and some of the properties which IVIiddleton 
has given to his hags, excite smiles. The Weird 
Sisters are serious things. Their presence cannot 
co-exist with mirth. But, in a lesser degree, the 
Witches of Middleton are fine creations. Their 
power too is, in some measure, over the mind. 
They raise jars, jealousies, strifes, like a thick satrf 
o'er life:' ^ 



JULIUS C^SAB 



Julius Cesar was one of the three principal plays, 
by different authors, pitched upon by the celebrated 
Earl of Halifax to be brought out in a splendid 
manner by subscription, in the year 1707. The 
other two were the King and ^^o King of Fletcher, 
and Dryden's Maiden Queen. There perhaps might 
be political rensons for this selection, as far as 
regards our author. Otherwise, Shakspeare's Julius 
C-^ESAR is not equal, as a whole, to either of his other 
plays taken from the Roman history. It is inferiour 
in interest to Coriolanus, and both in interest and 
power to Antony and Cleopatra. It however abounds 
in admirable and affecting passages, and is remark- 
able for the profound knowledge of character, ia 
which Shakspeare could scarcely fail. Jf there is 
any exception to this remark, it is in the hero 
of the piece himself. We do not much admire the 
representation here given of Julius Cffisar, nor do we 
think it answers to the portrait given of him in his 
Commentaries. He makes several vapouring and 
rather pedantick speeches, and does nothing. In- 
deed, he has nothing to do. So far, the fault of the 
character might be the fault of the plot. 



JUUUS CESAR. o^ 

The spirit with which the poet has entered at 
once into the manners of the common people, and 
the jealousies and heart-burnings of the different 
factions, is shewn in the first scene, when Flavins 
and Marullus, tribunes of the people, and some citi- 
zens of Rome, appear upon the stage. 

" Flavins. Thou art a cobbler, art thou ? 

Cobbler. Truly, Sir, all that I live by, is the and .• \ meddle with 
no tradesman's matters, nor woman's matters, but jvilh al, I am 
indeed, Sir, a surgeon to old shoes j when they are in great danger, I 
recover them. 

Flavins. But wherefore art not in thy shop to day p 
Why do'st thou lead these men about the streets p 

Cobbler. Truly, Sir, to wear out their shoes, to get myself into 
more work. But indeed, Sir, we make holiday to see Caesar, and 
rejoice in his triumph." 

To this specimen of quaint low humour immediate- 
ly follows that unexpected and animated burst of in- 
dignant eloquence, put into the mouth of one of the 
angry tribunes. 

•• Mnmllus. Wherefore rejoice ! — What conquest brings 
he home ? 
What tributaries follow him to Rome, 
To grace in captive bonds his chariot wheels ? 
Oh you hard hearts, you cruel men of Rome ! 
Knew you not Pompey p Many a time and oft 
Have you climb'd up to wails and battlements, 
To towers and windows, yea, to chimney lops, 
Your infants in your arm?, and there have sat 
The live long day with patient expectation. 
To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome : 
And when you saw his chariot but appear. 
Have you not made an uiiiveisal shout, 
That Tiber trembled underneath his Iwoks 

5 * 



.^4 JULIUS CiESAR. 

To hear the replication of your sounds, 
Made in his concave shores? 
And do you now put on your best attire ? 
And do you now cull cut an holiday ? 
And do you now strew flowers in his way 
That comes in triumph over Pompey'^ blood ? 

Begone 

Run to your houses, fall upon your knee?, * 

Pray to the Gods to intermit the plague. 
That needs must light on this ingratitude." 

The -svell known dialogue between Bru(us and 
Cassias, in which the latter breaks the design of 
the conspiracy to the former, and partly gains him 
over to it, is a noble piece of high nJnded declama- 
tion. Cassius's insisting on the pretended effemina- 
cy of Caesar's character, and his description of their 
swimming across the Tiber together, " once upon a 
raw and gusty day," are among the finest strokes in 
it. But |)erhaps the whole is not equal to the short 
scene which follows when Caesar enters with his 
train. 

" Brutus. The games are done, and Csssar is returning, 

Cassius. As I hey pass by, pluck Casca by the sleeve, 
And he will, after his sour fashion, tell you 
What has proceeded worthy note to day. 

Briihis. \ will do so : but look you, Cassius — 
The angry spot doth glow ou Cse^sar's brow, 
And all the rest look like a chidden train. 
Calphurnia's cheek is pale; and Cicero 
Looks with siich ferret and such fiery eyes^ 
As we have seen him in the Capitol, 
Being ciost in conference by some senators. 

Cassius. Casca will teli us what the matter.ia. 

CcESnr. Actonius 

Av.iony, Csesar? 



JULIUS C^SAR. b'^ 

Ccemr. Let roe have men about me that are fat, 
Sleek headed men, and such as sleep a nights : 
Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look, 
He thinks too much ; such men are dangerous. 

Antony. Fear him not, Caesar, he's not dangerous : 
He is a noble Roman, and well given. 

Cotmr. Would he were fatter; but I fear him not : 
Yet if my name were liable to fear, 
I do not know the man I should avoid 
So sooii as tiiat spare Cassias. He reads much ; 
He is a great observer ; and he looks 
Quite through the deeds of men. He loves no plays^ 
As thou dost, \ntony j he liears no musick: 
Seldom he smiles, and smiles in such a sort, 
As if he mock'd hiiDself, and scorn'd his spirit, 
That could be mov'd to smile at any thing. 
Such men as he be never at heart's ease, 
Wiiilst they behold a greater than themselves ] 
And therefore are they very dangerous. 
I rather tell thee what is to be feai'd 
Than what I fear ; for always I am Caesar. 
Come on my right hand, for tiiis ear is deaf. 
And tell me truly what thou think'st of him." 

We know hardly any passage more expressive of 
the genius of Shakspeare than this. It is as if he 
had been actually present, had known the different 
characters and what they tliought of one another, 
and had taken down what he heard and saw, their 
looks, words, and gestures, just as they happenecL 

The character of Mark Antony is farther speculat- 
ed u[)on where the conspirators deliberate whether 
he shall fall with Caesar. Brutus is against it — 

" And for Mark Antony, think not of him : 
For he can do no more than Csesai's ariD, 
Whea Csesai's head is otF. 



56 JULIUS CiESAR. 

Cassius. Yet do 1 fear him : 
For in th* ingrafted love he bears to Caesar — 

Brutus. Alas, good Cassius, do not think of him : 
If he loves Caesar, all that he can do 
Is to himself, take thought, and die for Caesar; 
And that were much, he should ; for he is giv'n 
To sports, to wilduess, and much company. 

Trebonius. There is no fear in him ; let him not die : 
For he will live, and laugh at this hereafter." 

They were in the wrong; and Cassius was right. 

The honest manliness of Brutiis is however suffi- 
cient to find out the unfitness of Cicero to be includ- 
ed in tijeir enterprise, from his affected egotism and 
literary vanity. 

" O, name him not : let us not break with him ; 
For he will never foMow any thing, 
That other men begin." 

His skepticism as to {)rodigies and his moralizing 
on the weather — " This disturlted sky is not to walk 
in" — are in the same sjjirit of refined iml.ecilily. 

Shakspeare has in this play and elsewhere, shewn 
the same penetration into political character, and the 
springs of publick events, as into those of every-day 
life. For instance, the whole design to liberate 
their country fails from the generous temprer and 
overweening confidence of Bruliis in the goodness 
of their cause and the assistance of others. Thus it 
has always been. Those who mean well themselves 
think well of others, and fill a jirey to their secu- 
rity. Tiiat humanity and sincerity which dispose 
men to resist injustice and tyranny render tliem un- 
fit to cope with the cunning and power of those 



JULIUS C^SAR. 57 

who are opposed to them. The friends of liberty 
trust to the professions of others, because they are 
themselves sincere, and endeavour to secure the 
publick good with the least possible hurt to its ene- 
mies, who have no regard to any thing but their 
own unprincipled ends, and stick at nothing to ac- 
complish them. Cassius was better cut out for a 
conspirator. FJis heart prompted his head. His 
huhitual jealousy miale him fear the worst that mi^ht 
hap()en, and his irritability of temper added to his 
inveteracy of purpose, and sharpened his patriotism. 
The mixed nature of his motives made him fitter 
to contend with bad men. The vices are never so 
well employed as in combating one another. Ty- 
ranny and servility are to be dealt with after their 
own fashion : otherwise, they will triumph over 
those who spare them, and tiually pronounce their 
funeral panegyrick, as Antony did that of Brutus. 

•' All the conspirators, save only he, 

Did that they did, in envy of gieat Caesar : 

He only in a general honest thought 

And common good to all, made one of them." 

The quarrel between Brutus and Cassius is managed 
in a masterly way. The dramatick fluctuation of 
passion, the calmness of Brutus, the heat of Cas- 
sius, are admirably described ; and the exclamation 
of Cassius on hearing of the death of Portia, which 
he does not learn till after their reconciliation, 
" How 'scap'd I killing when I crost you so ?" gives 
double force to all that has gone before. The scene 
between Brutus and Portia, where she endeavours to 



58 JULIUS C^SAR. 

extort the secret of the conspiracy from him, is con^ 
ceived in the most heroical spirit, and the burst of 
tenderness in Brutus — 

" You are my true and honourable wife ; 
As dear to me as are the ruddy drops 
That visit my sad heart" — 

is justified by her whole behaviour. Portia's breath- 
less impatience to learn the event of the conspiracy^ 
in the dialogue with Lucius, is full of passion. The 
interest which Portia takes in Brulus, and that which 
Calphurnia takes in the fate of Caesar, are discrimi- 
nated with the nicest f»recision. Mark Antony's 
speech over the dead body of Caesar has been justly 
admired for the mixture of pathos and artifice in it • 
that of Brutus certainly is not so good. 

The entrance of the conspirators to the house of 
JBrutus at midnight is rendered very impressive. 
In the midst of this scene, we meet with one of 
those careless and natural digressions which occur 
so frequently and beautifully in Shakspeare. After 
Cassius has introduced his friends one by one, Brutus 
says, 

•* They are all welcome. 
What watchful cares do interpose themselves 
Betwixt your eyes and night ? 

Cassius. Shall I entreat a word ? {They whisper.) 

Decius. Here lies the east : doth not the day break here ? 

Casca. No. 

Cinna. O pardon, Sir, it doth; and yon grey lines, 
That fret the clouds, are messengers of day. 

Casca. You shall confess, that you are both deceiv'd ■• 
Here, as I point my sword, the sun arises, 
Which ia a great way growing on the south, 



JULIUS C^SAR. 59 

Weighing the youthful season of the year. 

Some two months hence, up higher toward the north 

He first presents his fire, and the high east 

Stands as the Capitol, directly here." 

We cannot help thinking this graceful familiarity 
better than all the formality in the world. The 
truth of history in Julius CiESAR is very ably 
worked up with draraatick effect. The councils of 
generals, the doubtful turns of battles are represent- 
ed to the life. The death of Brutus is worthy of 
him — it has the dignity of the Roman senator with 
the firmness of the Stoick philosopher. But what 
is perhaps better than either, is the little incident of 
his boy, Lucius, falling asleep over his instrument, 
as he is playing to his master in his tent, the night 
before the battle. Nature had played him the same 
forgetful trick once before on the night of the con- 
spiracy. The humanity of Brutus is the same on 
both occasions. 



" It is no matter 



Enjoy the honey-heavy dew of slumber. 
Tiioii hast no figures nor no fantasies, 
Which busy care draws in tiie brains of men. 
Therefore theu sleep'st so sound." 



OTHELLO. 



It has been said that trao:edy purifies the affections 
by terrourand pity. That is, it substitutes imag;ina- 
ry sympathy for mere selfishness. It gives us a high 
and permanent interest, beyond ourselves, in humani- 
ty as such. It raises the great, the remote, and the 
possible to an equality with the real, the little and 
the near. It makes man a partaker with his kind. It 
subdues and softens the stubbornness of his will. It 
teaches him that there are and have been others 
like himself, by shewing him, as in a glass, what 
they have felt, thought, and done. It opens the 
chambers of the human heart. It leaves nothing in- 
different to us that can affect our common nature. 
It excites our sensibility by exhibiting the passions 
wound up to the utmost pitch by (he power of imagi- 
nation or the temj)talion of circumstances; and cor- 
rects their fatal excesses in ourselves, l:y pointing to 
the greater extent of sufferings and of crimes to 
which they have led others. Tragedy creates a 
balance of the affections. It makes us thoughtful 
spectators in the lists of life. It is the refiner of the 



OTHELLO. 61 

species; a discipline of humanity. The habitual 
study of poetry and works of imagination is one 
chief part of a well grounded education. A taste 
for liberal art is necessary to complete the character 
of a gentleman. Science alone is hard ^nd mechani- 
cal. It exercises the understanding upon things 
out of ourselves, while it leaves the affections un- 
employed, or engrossed with our own immediate, 
narrow interests. — Othello furnishes an illustration 
of these remarks. It excites our sympathy in an 
extraordinary degree. The moral it conveys has 
a closer application to the concerns of human life 
than that of any other of Shakspeare's plays. "It 
comes directly home to the bosoms and business of 
men." The pathos in Lear is indeed more dreadful 
and overpowering : but it is less natural, and less of 
every day's occurrence. We have not the same de- 
gree of sympathy with the passions described in 
Macbeth. The interest in Hamlet is more remote 
and reflex. That of Othello is at once equally pro- 
found and affecting. 

The picturesque contrasts of character in this play 
are almost as remarkable as the depth of the passion. 
The Moor Othello, the gentle Desdemona, the 
villain lago, the good natured Cassio, the fool Rode- 
rigo, present a range and variety of character as 
striking and palpable as that produced by the oppo- 
sition of costume in a picture. Their distinguish- 
ing qualities stand out to the mind's eye, so that 
even when we are not thinking of their actions or 
sentiments, the idea of their persons is still as pre- 
sent to us as ever. These characters^ and the images 
6 



62 OTHELLO. 

they stamp upon the mind are the farthest asunder 
possible, the distance between them is immense : 
j^et the compass of knowledge and invention, which 
the poet has shewn in embodying these extreme cre- 
ations of his genius, is only greater than the truth 
and felicitj , with which he has identified each cha- 
racter with itself, or blended their different quali- 
ties together in the same story. What a contrast the 
character of Othello forms to that of lago : at the 
same time, the force of conception, with which these 
two figures are opposed to each other, is rendered 
still more intense by the complete consistency with 
which the traits of each character are brought out in 
a state of the highest finishing. The making one 
black and the other while, the one unprincipled, the 
other unfortunate in the extreme, would have an- 
swered the common purposes of effect, and satisfied 
the ambition of an ordinary painter of character. 
Shakspeare has laboured the finer shades of differ- 
ence in both, with as much care and skill, as if he 
had had to depend on the execution alone for the suc- 
cess of his design. On the other hand, Desdemona 
and Emilia are not meant to be opposed with any 
thing like strong contrast to each other. Both are, 
to outward appearance, characters of common life, 
not more distinguished than women usually are, by 
difference of rank and situation. The difference of 
their thoughts and sentiments is however laid as 
open, their minds are separated from each other by 
signs as plain and as little to be mistaken, as the com- 
plexions of their husbands. 



OTHELLO. 63 

The movement of the passion in Othello is exceed- 
ingly different from that of Macbeth. In Macbeth 
there is a violent struggle between opposite feelings, 
between ambition and the stings of conscience, 
almost from first to last : in Olheilo, the doubtful 
conflict between contrary passions, though dreadful, 
continues only for a short time, and the chief interest 
is excited by the alternate ascendancy of different 
passions, the entire and unforseen change from the 
fondest love and most unbounded confidence, to the 
tortures of jealousy and the madness of hatred. 
The revenge of Othello, after it has once taken 
thorough possession of his mind, never quits it, but 
grows stronger and stronger at every moment of its 
delay. The nature of the Moor is noble, confiding, 
tender, and generous ; but his blood is of the most 
inflammable kind ; and being once roused by a sense 
of his WTongs, he is stopped by no considerations of 
remorse or pity, till he has given a loose to all the 
dictates of his rage and his despair. It is in work- 
ing his noble nature up to this extremity, through ra- 
pid but gradual transitions, in raising passion to its 
height from the smallest beginnings and in spite of 
all obstacles, in painting the expiring conflict between 
love and hatred, tenderness and resentment, jealousy 
and remorse, in unfolding the strength and the weak- 
nesses of our nature, in uniting sublimity of thought 
with the anguish of the keenest wo, in putting in 
motion the various impulses that agitate this our mor- 
tal being, and at last blending them in that noble 
tide of deep and sustained passion, impetuous but 
majestick, that *' flows on to the Propontick, and 



64 OTHELLO. 

knows no ebb," that Shakspeare has shewn the mas- 
tery of his genius and of his power over the human 
heart. The third act of Othello is his master- 
piece, not of knowledge or passion separately, but of 
the two combined, of the knowledge of character 
with the expression of passion, of consummate art in 
the keeping up of appearances, with the profound 
workings of nature, and the convulsive movements 
of uncontrolable agony, of the power of inflicting 
torture and of suffering it. Not only is the tumult of 
passion heaved up from the very bottom of the soul, 
but even the slightest undulation of feeling is seen 
on the surface, as it arises from the impulses of 
imagination or the different probabilities maliciously 
suggested by lago. The progressive preparation for 
the catastrophe is wonderfully manag^ed from the 
Moor's first gallant recital of the story of his love, of 
*' the spells and witchcraft he had used," from his 
unlocked for and roraantick success, the fond satisfac- 
tion with which he dotes on his own happiness, the 
unreserved tenderness of Desdemona and her inno- 
cent importunities in favour of Cassio, irritating the 
suspicions instilled into her husband's mind by the 
perfidy of Ligo, and rankling there to poison, till he 
loses all command of himself, and his rage can only 
be appeased by blood. She is introduced, just before 
lago begins to put his scheme in practice, pleading 
for Cassio with all the thoughtless gayety of friend- 
ship and winning confidence in the love of Othello. 

" What ! Michael Cassio ? 
That came a wooing with you, and so many a time, 
W^hen I have spoke of you dispraisingly, 



OTHELLO. 65 

Hath ta'en your part, to have so much to do 

To bring him in ? — Why this is not a boon : 

'Tis as I should intreat you wear your gloves, 

Or feed on nourishing meats, or keep you warmj 

Or sue to you to do a peculiar profit 

To your own person. Nay, when 1 have a suit, 

Wherein 1 mean to touch your love indsed, 

It shall be full of poise, and fearful to be granted." 

Othello's confidence, at first only staggered by 
broken hints and insinuations, recovers itself at sight 
of Desdemona ; and he exclaims 

" If she be false, O then Heav'n mocks itself : 
I'll not believe it." 

But presently after, on brooding over his suspicions 
by himself, and yielding to his apprehensions of the 
worst, his smothered jealousy breaks out into open 
fury, and he returns to demand satisfaction of lago, 
like a wild beast stung with the envenomed shaft of 
the hunters. " Look where he comes," &c. In 
this state of exasperation and violence, after the 
first paroxysms of his grief and tenderness have had 
their vent in that passionate apostrophe, " I felt 
not Cassio's kisses on her lips," lago by false 
aspersions, and by presenting the most revolting 
images to his mind,* easily turns the storm of passion 
from himself against Desdemona, and works him up 
into a trembling agony of doubt and fear, in which 
he abandons all his love and hopes in a breath. 

♦' Now do I see 'tis true. Look here, lago, 

All my fond love thus do 1 blow to Heav'a. 'Tis^one. 



• See the passage beginning, " It is impossible you shouM see 
this, were they as prime as goats," &c. 



6* 



t>6 OTHELLO. 

Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell ; 
Yield up, O love, thy crown and hearted throne " 
To tyrannous hate ! Swell bosom with thy fraught ; 
For 'tis of aspicks' tongues." 

From this time, his raging thoughts " never look 
back, ne'er ebb to humble love" till his revenge is 
sure of its object, the painful regrets and involuntary 
recollections of past circumstances, which cross his 
mind amidst the dim trances of passion, aggravating 
the sense of his wrongs^ but not shaking his pur- 
pose. Once, indeed, where lago shews him Cas- 
sio with the handkerchief in his hand, and making 
sport (as he thinks) of his misfortunes, the intolerable 
bitterness of his feelings, the extreme sense of shame, 
makes him fall to praising her accomplishments and 
relapse into a momentary fit of weakness, " Yet, Oh 
the pity of it, lago, the pity of it !" This returning fond 
ness however only serves, as il is managed by lago, to 
whet his revenge, and set his heart more against her. 
In his conversations with Desdemona, the persuasion 
of her guilt and the immediate proofs of her duplicity 
seem to irritate his resentment and aversion to her ; 
but in the scene immediately preceding her death, 
the recollection of his love returns upon him in all 
its tenderness and force ; and after her death, he all 
at once forgets his wrongs in the sudden an irrepara- 
ble sense of his loss. 

" My wife ! My wife ! What wife P I have no wife. 
Oh insupportable! Oh heavy hour !" 

This happens before he is assured of her inno= 
cence; but afterwards bis remorse is as dreadful as 



OTHELLO. 6r 

his revenge has been, and yields only to fixed and 
death-like despair. His farewell speech, before he 
kills himself, in which he conveys his reasons to 
the senate for the murder of his wife, is equal to 
the first speech in which he gave them an account 
of his courtship of her, and " his whole course of 
love." Such an ending was alone worthy of such 
a commencement. 

If any thing could add to the force of our sym- 
pathy with Othello, or compassion for his fate, it 
would be the frankness and generosity of his nature, 
which so little deserve it. When lago first begins 
to practice upon his unsuspecting friendship, he 
answers — 



'Tis not to make me jealous, 



To say my wife is fair, feeds well, loves company, 
Is free of speech, sings, plays, and dances well j 
Where virtue is, these are most virtuous. 
Nor from my own weak merits will 1 draw 
The smallest fear or doubt of her revolt, 
For she had eyes and chose me." 

This character is beautifully (and with affecting sim- 
plicity) confirmed by what Desdemona herself says 
of him to jEmilia after she has lost the handker- 
chief, the first pledge of his love to her. 

'* Believe me, I had rather have lost my purse 
Full of cruuadoes. And but my noble Moor 
Is true of mind, and made of no such baseness, 
As jealous creatures are, it were enough 
To put him to ill thinking. 

Emilia. Is he not jealous ? 

Desdemona. Who, he ? 1 think the sun where he was born 
Drew all sach humours from him." 



68 OTHELLO. 

In a short speech of iEmelia*s, there occurs one 
of those side intimations of the fluctuations of pas- 
sion which we seldom meet with but in Shakspeare. 
After Othello has resolved upon the death of his 
wife, and bids her dismiss her attendant for the 
night, she answers, 

•' I will, my Lord. 

Emilia. How goes it now ? He looks gentler than he did." 

Shakspeare has here put into half a line what 
some authors would have spun out into ten set 
speeches. 

The character of Desdemona herself is inimi- 
table both in itself, and as it contrasts with Othel- 
lo's groundless jealousy, and with the foul con- 
spiracy of which she is the innocent victim. Her 
beauty and external graces are only indirectly 
glanced at; we see " her visage in her mind;" her 
character every where predominates over her per- 
son. 

" A maiden never bold : 

Of spirit so still and quiet, that her motion 

Blushed at itself." 

There is one fine compliment paid to her by Cas- 
sio, who exclaims trium})hantly when she comes 
ashore at Cyprus after the storm, 

•' Tempests themselves, high seas, and howling winds, 
As having sense of beauty, do omit 
Their mortal natures ; letting safe go by 
The divine Desdemona." 

In general, as is the case with most of Shak- 
speare's females, we lose sight of her personal charms 



OTHELLO. 69 

in her attachment and devotedness to her husband. 
" She is subdued even to the very quality of her 
lord;" and to Othello's "honours and his valiant 
parts her soul and fortunes consecrates." The lady 
protests so much herself, and she is as good as her 
word. The truth of conception, with which timidi- 
ty and boldness are united in the same character, 
is marvellous. The extravagance of her resolu- 
tions, the pertinacity of her affections, may be said 
to arise out of the gentleness of her nature. They 
imply an unreserved reliance on the purity of her 
own intentions, an entire surrender of her fears to 
her love, a knitting of herself (heart and soul) to 
the fate of another. Bating the commencement of 
her passion, which is a little fantastical and head- 
strong (though even that may perhaps be consist- 
ently accounted for from her inability to resist a 
rising inclination*) her whole character consists in 
having no will of her own, no prompter but her 
obedience. Her romantick turn is only a conse- 
quence of the domestick and practical part of her 
disposition; and instead of following Othello to the 
wars, she would gladly have " remained at home 
a moth of peace," if her husband could have staid 
with her. Her resignation and angelick sweetness 
of temper do not desert her at the last. The scenes 
in which she laments and tries to account for Othel- 
lo's estrangement from her are exquisitely beauti- 
ful. After he has struck her, and called her names, 
she says, 

* " lago. Ay, too gentle. 
Othello. IV ay, that's certain." 



TQ OTHELLO. 



Alas, lago, 



What shall I do to win my lord again ? 

Good friend, go lohim; for by this light of heaTen, 

I know not how I lost hire. Here I kneel j 

If e'er my will did tresp^.ss 'gaiost his love, 

Either in discoiirfe, or ihou^lt, or actual deed, . 

Or that mine eyes, ipine ears, or an} 6ease 

Delighted th?m < r any other forni j 

Or tb?t I do not, red ever did, 

And trer will, tbcogh be t^o shake n\e off 

To beggarly divorcocent. love bim dear:y, 

Ccrnio-t fc-swear me. UnkjoJness r^ay do much. 

And his unklndnf.-s may dt/eat .liy life, 

But never taint my iove 

lago. I pray you be content: 'tis but his humour. 
The bosiness of the state does him ofiroce. 

Dtsdemona. If 'twere no other !" — 

The scene '^hich follows with iEmilia and the 
song of the Willow, are equally beautiful, and shew 
the author's extreme power of varying the expres- 
sion of passion, in all its moods and in alt circum- 
stances. 

jEmilia. Would you had never seen him. 

Dtsdemona. So would not I : my love doth so approve him, 
That even his stubbomuess, his checks, his frowns. 
Have grace and favour in tbein," &:c. 

Not the unjust suspicions of Othello, not lago's 
treachery, place Desdemona in a more amiable or in- 
teresting light than the casual conversation (half 
earnest, half jest) between her and Emilia, on the 
common behaviour of women to their husbands. 
This dialogue takes place just before the last fatal 
scene. If Othello had overheard it, it would have 



OTHELLO. 71 

prevented the whole catastrophe ; but then it would 
have spoiled the play. 

The character of lago is one of the supereroga- 
tions of Shakspeare's genius. Some persons, more 
nice than wise, have thought this whole character 
unnatural, because his villany is without a sufficient 
motive. Shakspeare, who was as good a philosopher 
as he was a poet, thought otherwise. He knew that 
the love of power, which is another name for the 
love of mischief, is natural to man. He would 
know this as well or better than if it had been de- 
monstrated to him by a logical diagram, merely from 
seeing children paddle in the dirt or kill flies for 
sport. lago in fact belongs to a class of characters, 
common to Shakspeare, and at the same time peculiar 
to him ; whose heads are as acute and active as their 
hearts are hard and callous. lago is to be sure an ex- 
treme instance of the kind ; that is to say, of diseased 
intellectual activity, with an almost perfect indiffer- 
ence to moral good or evil, or rather with a decided 
preference of the latter, because it falls more readi- 
ly in with his favourite propensity, gives greater 
zest to his thoughts and scope to his actions. He 
is quite or nearly as indifferent to his own fate as to 
that of others ; he runs all risks for a trifling and 
doubtful advantage; and is himself the dupe and 
victim of his ruling passion — an insatiable craving 
after action of the most difficult and dangerous kind. 
" Our ancient" is a philosopher, who fancies that a lie 
that kills has more point in it than an alliteration or 
an antithesis; who thinks a fatal experiment on the 
peace of a family a better thing than watching the 



m^ 



72 OTHELLO. 

palpitations in the heart of a flea in a microscope ; 
who plots the ruin of his friends as an exercise for 
his ingenuity, and stabs men in the dark to prevent 
ennui. His gayety, such as it is, arises from the suc- 
cess of his treachery ; his ease from the torture he 
has inflicted on others. He is an amateur of trage- 
dy in real life ; and instead of employing his inven- 
tion on imaginary characters, or long forgotten inci- 
dents, he takes the bolder and more desperate course 
of getting up his plot at home, casts the principal 
parts among his nearest friends and connexions, and 
rehearses it in downright earnest, with steady nerves 
and unabated resolution. We will just give an illus- 
tration or two. 

One of his most characteristick speeches is that 
immediately after the marriage of Othello. 

" Roderigo. What a full fortune does the thick lips owe, 
If he can carry her thus ! 

lago. Call up her father : 
Rouse him {Olhello) nsake after him, poison his delight, 
Proclaim him in the streets, incense her kinsmen, 
And the' he in a fertile climate dwell, 
Plague him with flies : Tho' that his joy be joy, 
Yet throw such changes of vexation on it, 
As it may lose some colour.". 

In the next passage, his imagination runs riot 
in the mischief he is plotting, and breaks out 
into the wildness and impetuosity of real enthusi- 
asm. 

" Roderigo. Here is her father's house : I'll call aloud 
lago. Do, with like limorous accent and dire yell, 

As when, by night and negligecce, the fire 

Is spied in populous cities." 



OTHELLO. 73 

One of his most favourite topicks, on which he is 
rich indeed, and in descanting on which his spleen 
serves him for a Muse, is the disproportionate match 
between Desdemona and the Moor. This is a clue 
to the character of the lady which he is by no means 
ready to part with. It is brought forward in the first 
scene, and he recurs to it, when in answer to his in- 
sinuations against Desdemona, Roderigo says, 

" I cannot believe that in her — she's full of most blest conditions. 
lago. Bless'd fig's end. The wine she drinks is made of grapes. 
If she had been blest, she would never Jiave married the Moor," 

And again with still more spirit and fatal effect af- 
terwards, when he turns this very suggestion arising 
in Othello's own breast to her prejudice. 

" Othello. And yet, how nature erring from itself — 
lago. Aye, there's the point j— as to be bold with you, 
Not to aflfect many proposed matches 
Of her own clime, complexion, and degree." &c. 

This is probing to the quick. lago here turns the 
character of poor Desdemona, as it were, inside out. 
It is certain that nothing but the genius of Shak- 
speare could have preserved the entire interest and 
delicacy of the part, and have even drawn an ad- 
ditional elegance and dignity from the peculiar cir- 
cumstances in which she is placed. — The habitual 
licentiousness of lago's conversation is not to be 
traced to the pleasure he takes in gross or lascivious 
images, but to his desire of finding out the worst 
side of every thing, and of proving himself an over- 
match for appearances. He has none of " the milk 
7 



^"4 OTHELLO. 

of human kindness" in his composition. His imagi- 
nation rejects every thing that has not a strong in- 
fusion of the most unpalatable ingredients ; his mind 
digests only poisons. Virtue, or goodness, or what- 
ever has the least "relish of salvation in it," is, to 
his depraved appetite, sickly and insipid : and he 
even resents the good opinion entertained of his ov\rn 
integrity, as if it were an affront cast on the mas- 
culine sense and spirit of his character. Thus at 
the meeting between Othello and Desdemona, he 
exclaims — " Oh, you are well tuned now : but I'll 
set down the pegs that make this musick, as honest 
as I am'^ — his character of bonhommie not sitting at 
all easily upon him. In the scenes, where he tries 
to work Othello to his purpose, he is proportionably 
guarded, insidious, dark^ and deliberate. We be- 
lieve nothing ever came up to the profound dissimu- 
lation and dextrous artifice of the well known dia- 
logue in the third act, where he first enters upon the 
execution of his design. 

' ' la go . M y noble lord . 

Othello. What dost thou say, lagop 

lago. Did Michael Cassio, 
When you woo'd my lady, know of your lovep 

Othello. He did, from first to last. 
Why dost thou ask ? 

Jago. But for a satisfaction of my thought, 
No further harm. 

Othello. Why of thy thought, lago ? 

lago. I did not think he had been acquainted with it. 

Othello. O yes, and went between>s very oft - 

lago. Indeed I 

Othello. Indeed.^ Ay, indeed. Discern'st thou aught of 
that P 



OTHELLO. T5 

h he not honest ? 

lago. Honesty my lord ? 

Othello. Honest ? Ay, honest. 

lago. My lord, for aught I know. 

OUiello. What do'st thou think ? 

lago. Think, my lord ! 

Othello. Think, my lord ! Alas, thou ccho'st me, 
As if there was some monster in thy thouglit 
Too hideous to be shewn."— 

The stops and breaks, the deep v/orkings of 
treachery under the mask of fove and lionesty, Ihe 
anxious wa^chfuhiess, the cool earnestness, and if 
we may so say, the passion of hypocrisy marked in 
every line, receive their last finishing in that incon- 
ceivable burst of pretended indignation at Othello's 
doubts of his sincerity. 

•' O grace ! O Heaven forgive me ! 

Are you a man !^ Have you a soul or sense ? 

God be wi' you ; take mine office. O wretched fool, 

That lov'st to make thine honesty a vice ! 

Oh monstrous world ! take note, take note, O world ! 

To be direct and honest, is not safe. 

I thank you for tiiis profit, and from hence 

I'll love no friend, since love breeds such offence." 

If lago is detestable enough vshen he has busi- 
ness on bis hands and all his engines at work, he is 
still worse when he has nothing to do, and we only 
see into the hollowness of his heart. His indiffe- 
rence when Othello falls into a swoon, is perfectly 
diabolical. 

" lago. How is it, General ? Have you not hurt your head p 

Othello. Do'st thou mock me;^ 

laero. I mock vnn not hv Mpnvpn " ,S/f 



Othello. Do'st thou mock me;^ 

lago. 1 mock you not, by Heaven," &c. 



76 OTHELLO. 

The part indeed would hardly be tolerated, eTen 
as a foil to the virtue and generosity of the other 
characters in the play, but for its indefatigable in- 
dustry and inexhaustible resources, which divert the 
attention of the spectator (as well as his own) from 
the end he has in view to the means by which it 
must be accomplished.— Edmund the Bastard in Lear 
is something of the same character, placed in less 
prominent circumstances. Zanga is a vulgar cari- 
cature of it. 



TIMON OF ATHENS. 



TiMON OP Athens always appeared to us to be 
•written with as intense a feeling of his subject as 
any one play of Shakspeare. It is one of the few 
in which he seems to be in earnest throughout, 
never to trifie nor go out of his way. He does not 
relax in his efforts, nor lose sight of the unity of his 
design. It is the only play of our author in which 
spleen is the predominant feeling of the mind. It 
is as much a satire as a play : and contains some 
of the finest pieces of invective possible to be con- 
ceived, both in the snarling, captious answers of the 
cynick Apemantus, and in the impassioned and 
more terrible imprecations of Timon. The latter 
remind the classical reader of the force and swel- 
ling impetuosity of the moral declamations in Juvenal, 
while the former have all the keenness and caustick 
severity of the old Stoick philosophers. The soul 
of Diogenes appears to have been seated on the lips 
of Apemantus. The churlish profession of misan- 
thropy in the cynick is contrasted with the profound 
feeling of it in Timon, and also with the soldier- 
7 * 



TS TIMON OF ATHENS. 

like and determined resentment of Alcibiades against 
his countrymen, who have banished him, though 
this forms only an incidental episode in the tra- 
gedy. 

The fable consists of a single event ; — of the 
transition from the highest pomp and profusion of 
artificial refinement, to the most abject state of sav- 
age life, and privation of all social intercourse. The 
change is as rapid as it is complete; nor is the de- 
scription of the rich and generous Timon, banquet- 
ting in gilded palaces, pampered by every luxury, 
prodigal of his hospitality, courted by crowds of 
flatterers, poets, painters, lords, ladies, who — 

" Follow his strides, his lobbies fill with tendance, 
Rain sacrificial wisperings iu liis ear; 
And through him drink the free air" — 

more striking than that of the sudden falling off of 
his friends and fortune, and his naked exposure in 
a wild forest digging roots from the earth for his 
sustenance, with a lofty spirit of self-denial, and bit- 
ter scorn of the world, which raise him higher in 
our esteem than the dazzling gloss of prosperity 
could do. He grudges himself the means of life, 
and is only busy iu preparing his grave. How 
forcibly is the difference between what he was, 
and what he is described in Apemantus's taunting 
questions, when he comes to reproach him with the 
change in his way of life ! 

" What, think'st thon, 



That the bleak air, thy boisterous chamberlain, 
Will put thy shirt on warm ? will these moist trees 



TIMOiV OF ATHENS. 79 

That have out liv'd the eagle, page thy heels, 

And skip when thou point'st out? will the cold brook, 

Candied with ice, caudle thy morning taste 

To cure thy o'er night's surfeit ? OaU the creatures, 

Whose naked natures live in all the spight 

Of wreakful heav'n, whose bare unhoused trunks, 

To the conflicting elements expos'd, 

Answer mere nature, bid them flatter thee-" 

The manners are every where preserved with 
distinct truth. The poet and painter are very 
skilfully played off against one another, both affect- 
ing great attention to the other, and each taken up 
with his own vanity, and the superiority of his own 
art. Shakspeare has put into the mouth of the 
former a very lively description of the genius of 
poetry and of his own in particular. 

*' A thing slipt idly from me. 



Our poesy is as a gum, which issues 
From whence 'tis nourish'd. The fire i' th' flint 
Shews not till it be struck : our gentle flame 
Provokes itself— and like the current flies 
Each bound it chafes." 

The hollow friendship and shuffling evasions of 
the Athenian lords, their smooth professions and 
pitiful ingratitude, are very satisfactorily exposed, 
as well as the different disguises to which the mean- 
ness of self-love resorts in such cases to hide a 
want of generosity and good faith. The lurking 
selfishness of Apemantus does not pass undetected 
amidst the grossness of his sarcasms and his con- 
temi)t for the preteo^ions of others. Even the two 
courtezans who accompany Alcibiades to the cave 
of Timoa are very characteristically sketched ; and 



80 TIMON OF ATHENS. 

the thieves who came to visit him are also " true 
men" in their way. — An excej)tion to this general 
picture of selfish de})ravity is found in the old and 
honest steward Flavius, to whom Timon pays a full 
tribute of tenderness, fehf^.kspeare was unwilling to 
draw a picture " all over vgty with hypocrisy.'''' He 
owed this character to the good natured solicitations 
of his Muse. His mind was well said by Ben Jon- 
son to be the "sphere of humanity." 

The moral sententiousness of this play equals that 
of Lord Bacon's Treatise on the Wisdom of the 
Ancients, and is indeed seasoned with greater varie- 
ty. Every topick of contempt or indignation is 
here exhausted; but while the sordid licentiousness 
of Apemantus, which turns every thing to gall and 
bitterness, shews only the natural virulence of his 
temper and antipathy to good or evil alike, Timon 
does not utter an imprecation without betraying the 
extravagant workings of disappointed passion, of love 
altered to hate. Apemantus sees nothing good in 
any object, and exaggerates whatever is disgusting 
Timon is tormented with the perpetual contrast be- 
tween things and appearances, between the fresh, 
tempting outside, and the rottenness within, and in- 
vokes mischiefs on the heads of mankind propor- 
tioned to the sense of bis wrongs and of their treache- 
ries. He impatiently cries out, when he finds the gold, 

" This yellow slave 
Will knit and break religions ; biess the accurs'd; 
Make the hoar leprosy adord ; place thieves, 
And give them title, knee, and approbation, 
■With senators on the bench : this is it. 



TJMON OF ATHENS. 81 

That makes the wappen'd widow wed again ; 
She, whom the spital house 
Would cast the gorge at, this embalms and spices 
To th? April day again.^^ 

One of his most dreadful imprecations is that which 
occurs immediately on his leaving Athens. 

" Let me look back upon thee, O thou wall, 
That girdlest in those wolves ! Dive in the earth, 
And fence not Athens ! Matrons, turn incontinent ; 
Obedience fail in children ; slaves and fools 
Pluck the grave wrinkled senate from the bench, 
And minister in their steadg. To general filths 
Convert o' th' instant green virginity ! 
Do't in your parents' eyes. Bankrupts, hold fast ; 
Rather than render back, out with your knives, 
And cut your trusters' throats ! Bound servants, steal: 
Large-handed robbers your grave masters are, 
And pill by law. Maid, to thy master's bed : 
Thy mistress is o' th' brothel. Son of sixteen. 
Pluck the lin'd crutch from thy old limping sire. 
And with it beat his brains out ! Fear and piety, 
Religion to the Gods, peace, justice, truth, 
Domestick awe, night-rest, and npighbourhood, 
Instructions, manners, mysteries and trades. 
Degrees, observances, customs and laws. 
Decline to your confounding contraries ; 
And let confusion live ! — Plagues, incident to men, 
Your potent and infectious fevers heap 
Gn Athens, ripe for stroke ! Thou cold sciatica, 
Cripple our senators, that their limbs may halt 
As lamely as their manners ! Lust and liberty 
Creep in the minds and marrows of our youth, 
That 'gainst the stream of virtue they may strive, 
And drown themselves in riot ! Itches, blains, 
Sow all th' Athenian bosoms ; and their crop 
Be general leprosy : breath infect breath. 
That their society (as their friendship) may 
Be merely poison !" 



82 TIMON OF ATHENS. 

Timon is here just as ideal in bis passion for ill, 
as he had before been in his belief of good. Apeman- 
tus was satisfied with the mischief existing in the 
world, and with his own ill-nature. One of the most 
decisive intimations of Timon's morbid jealousy of 
appearances is in his answer to Apemantus, who 
asks him, 

" What things in the world can'st thou nearest compare with 
thy flatterers ? 

Timon. Women nearest : but men, men are the things them- 
selves." 

Apemantus, it is said, ** loved few things better 
than to abhor himself." This is not the case with 
Timon, who neither loves to abhor himself nor 
others. All his vehement misanthropy is forced, up- 
hill work. From the slippery turns of fortune, from 
the turmoils of passion and adversity, he wishes to 
sink mto the quiet of the grave. On that subject 
his thoughts are intent, on that he finds time and 
place to grow romantick. He digs his own grave by 
the sea shore; contrives his funeral ceremonies 
amidst the pomp of desolation, and builds his mau- 
soleum of the elements. 

" Come not to me again ; but say to Athens, 
Timon hath made his everlasting mansion 
Upon the beached verge of the salt flood j 
W^hich once a day with his embossed froth 
The turbulent surge shall cover. — Thither come, 
And let my gravestone be youi oracle." 

And again, Alcibiades, after reading his epitaph, 
says of him, 



TIMON OF ATHENS. 83 

" These well express in thee thy latter spirits : 
Though thou abhorred'st in us our human griefs, 
Scorn'd'st our brain's flow, and those our droplets, which 
From niggard nature fall ; yet rich conceit 
Taught thee to make vast Neptune weep for aye 
On thy low grave" 

thus making the winds his funeral dirge, his mourner 
the murmuring ocean, and seeking, in the everlasting 
solemnities of nature, oblivion of the transitory splen- 
dour of his life-time. 



CORIOLANUS, 



Shakspeare has in this play shewn himself well 
versed in history and state affairs. Coriolanus is a 
storehouse of political common places. Any one 
who studies it may save himself the trouble of read- 
ing Burke's Reflections, or Paine's Rights of Man, or 
the Debates in both Houses of Parliament since the 
French Revolution or our own. The arguments for 
and against aristocracy, or democracy, on the privi- 
leges of the few and the claims of the many, on liber- 
ty and slavery, power and the abuse of it, peace and 
war, are here very ably handled, with the spirit of a 
poet and the acuteness of a philosopher. Shakspeare 
himself seems to have had a leaning to the arbitrary 
side of the question, perhaps from some feeling of 
contempt for his own origin ; and to have spared no 
occasion of baiting the rabble. What he says of them 
is very true : what he says of their betters is also 
very true, though he dwells less upon it. — The cause 
of the people is indeed but little calculated as a sub- 
ject for poetry : it admits of rhetorick, which goes into 
argument and explanation, but it presents no imme- 



CORIOLANUS. 85 

diate or distinct images to the mind, "no jutting 
frieze, buttress, or coigne of vantage" for poetry 
" to make its pendant bed and procreant cradle in." 
The language of poetry naturally falls in with the 
language of power. The imagination is an exagge- 
rating and exclusive faculty : it takes from one thing 
to add to another : it accumulates circumstances to- 
gether to give the greatest possible effect to a favour- 
ite object. The understanding is a dividing and 
measuring faculty : it judges of things, not according 
to their immediate impression on the mind, but ac- 
cording to their relations to one another. The one 
is a monopolizing faculty, which seeks the greatest 
quantity of present excitement by inequality and dis- 
proportion ; the other is a distributive faculty, which 
seeks the greatest quantity of ultimate good, by jus- 
tice and proportion. The one is an aristocratical, 
the other a republican faculty. The principle of [)0- 
etry is a very anti-levelling principle. It aims at 
effect, it exists by contrast. It admits of no medium. 
It is every thing by excess. It rises above the or- 
dinary standard of sufferings and crimes. It presents 
a dazzling appearance. It shews its head turretted, 
crowned, and crested. Its front is gi(t and blood- 
stained. Before it " it carries noise, and behind it 
tears." It has its altars and its victims, sacrifices, hu- 
man sacrifices. Kings, priests, nobles, are its train- 
bearers, tyrants and slaves its executioners. — " Car- 
nage is its daughter." — Poetry is right-royal. It puts 
the individual for the species, the one above the infi- 
nite many, might before right. A lion hunting a 
flock of sheep or a herd of wild asses is a more poeti- 
8 



S6 CORIOLANUS. 

cal object than they ; and we even take part with 
the lordly beast, because our vanity or some other 
feeling makes us disposed to place ourselves in the 
situation of the strongest party. So we feel some 
concern for the poor citizens of Rome when they 
meet together to compare their wants and grievances, 
till Coriolanus comes in and with blows and big words 
drives this set of " poor rats," this rascal scum, to 
their homes and beggary before him. There is no- 
thing heroical in a multitude of miserable rogues not 
wishing to be starved, or complaining that they are 
like to be so : but when a single man comes forward 
to brave their cries and to make them submit to the 
last indignities, from mere pride and self-will, our ad- 
miration of his prowess is immediately converted into 
contempt for their pusillanimity. The insolence of 
power is stronger than the plea of necessity. The 
tame submission to usurped authority, or even the 
natural resistance to it, has nothing to excite or flat- 
ter the imagination : it is the assumption of a right 
to insult or oppress others that carries an imposing 
air of superiority with it. We had rather be the op- 
pressor than the oppressed. The love of power in 
ourselves and the admiration of it in others are both 
natural to man : the one makes him a tyrant, the 
other a slave. Wrong dressed out in pride, pomp, 
and circumstance has more attraction than abstract 
right. — Coriolanus complains of the fickleness of the 
people : yet the instant he cannot gratify his pride 
and obstinacy at their expense, he turns his arms 
against bis country. If his country was not worth 
defending, why did he build his pride on its defence ? 



CORIOLANUS. 87 

He is a conqueror and a hero ; he conquers other 
countries, and makes this a plea for enslaving his 
own ; and when he is prevented from doing so, he 
leagues with its enemies to destroy his country. He 
rates the people " as if he were a God to punish, and 
not a man of their infirmity." He scoffs at one of 
their tribunes for maintaining their rights and fran- 
chises : " Mark you his absolute shall .^" not marking 
his own absolute will to take every thing from them, 
his impatience of the slightest opposition to his own 
pretensions being in proportion to their arrogance and 
absurdity. If the great and powerful had the benefi- 
cence and wisdom of Gods, then all this would have 
been well : if with a greater knowledge of what is 
good for the people, they had as great a care for their 
interest as they have themselves, if they were seat- 
ed above the world, sympathizing with the welfare 
but not feeling the passions of men, receiving neither 
good nor hurt froca them, but bestow iug their benefits 
as free gifts on them, they might then rule over them 
like another Providence. But this is not the case. 
Coriolanus is unwilling that the senate should shew 
their " cares" for the people, lest their " cares" should 
be construed into " fears," to the subversion of all 
due authority ; and he is no sooner disappointed in 
his schemes to deprive the people, not only of the 
cares of the state, but of all power to redress them- 
selves, than Volumnia is made madly to exclaim, 

*' Now the red pestilence strike all trades in Rome, 
And occupations perish." 

This is but natural : it is but natural for a mother 
to have more regard for her son than for a whole 



88 CORIOLANUS. 

city ; but then the city should be left to take some 
care of itself. The care of the state cannot, we here 
see, be safely entrusted to maternal afifeclion, or to 
the domestick charities of high life. The great 
have private feelings of their own, to which the 
interests of humanity and justice must courtesy. 
Their interests are so far from being the same as 
those of the community, that they are in direct and 
necessary opposition to them ; their power is at the 
expense of our weakness ; their riches of our poverty ; 
their pride of our degradation ; their splendour of our 
wretchedness; their tyranny of our servitude. If 
they had the superiour knowledge ascribed to them 
(which they have not) it would only render them 
so much more formidable ; and from Gods would 
convert them into Devils. The whole dramatick 
moral of Coriolanus is, that those who have little 
shall have less, and that those who have much shall 
take all that others have left. The people are 
poor ; therefore they ought to be starved. They are 
slaves ; therefore they ought to be beaten. They work 
hard ; therefore they ought to be treated like beasts of 
burden. They are ignorant ; therefore they ought not 
to be allowed to feel that they want food, or clothing, 
or rest, that they are enslaved, oppressed, and mise- 
rable. This is the logick of the imagination and the 
passions ; which seek to aggrandise what excites 
admiration, and to heap contempt on miserj^, to raise 
power into tyranny, and to make tyranny absolute ; 
to thrust down that which is low still lower, and 
to make wretches desperate : to exalt magistrates 
into kings, kings into gods ; to degrade subjects to the 



CORIOLANUS. 89 

rank of slaves, and slaves to the condition of brutes. 
The history of mankind is a romance, a mask, a 
tragedy, constructed upon the principles of poetical 
justice ; it is a noble or royal hunt, in which what is 
sport to the few is death to the many, and in which 
the spectators halloo and encourage the strong to set 
upon the weak, and cry havock in the chase, though 
they do not share in the spoil. We may depend 
upon it that what men delight to read in books, they 
will put in practice in reality. 

One of the most natural traits in this play is the 
difference of the interest taken in the success of 
Coriolanus by his wife and mother. The one is only 
anxious for his honour ; the other is fearful for his 
life. 

" Volumnia. Methinks T hither hear your husband's drum 
I see him pluck AuBdius down by th' hair : 
Methinks I see him stamp thus— and call thus — 
Come 01), ye cowards ; ye were got in fear 
Though you were born in Rome ; his bloody brow 
With his mail'd hand then wiping, forth he goes 
Like to a harvest man, that's task'd to mow 
Or all, or lose his hire. 

Virgilia. His bloody brow ! Oh Jupiter, no blood. 

Volumnia. Away, you fool ; it more becomes a man 
Than gilt his trophy. The breast of Hecuba, 
When she did suckle Hector, look'd not lovelier 
Than Hector's forehead, when it spit forth blood 
At Grecian swords contending." 

When she hears the trumpets that proclaim her 
son's return, she says in the true spirit of a Roman, 
matron, 

" These are the ushers of Martius : before him 
He carries noise, and behind ;iim he leaves tears. 
8* 



98 CORIOLANUS. 

Death, that dark spirit, in's nervy arm doth lie, 
Which being advanc'd, declines, and then men die.'* 

Coriolanus himself is a complete character : his 
love of reputation, his contempt of popular opinion, 
his pride and modesty are consequences of each 
other. His pride consists in the inflexible sternness 
of his will : his love of glory is a determined desire 
to bear down all opposition, and to extort the admi- 
ration both of friends and foes. His contempt for 
popular favour, his unwillingness to hear his own 
praises, spring from the same source. He cannot 
contradict the praises that are bestowed upon him ; 
therefore he is impatient at hearing them. He 
would enforce the good opinion of others by his 
actions, but does not want their acknowledgments in 
words. 

" Pray now, no more : my mother, 
Who has a charter to extol her blood, 
When she does praise me, grieves me." 

His magnanimity is of the same kind. He admires 
in an enemy that courage which he honours in him- 
self: he places himself on the hearth of Auftdius with 
the same confidence that he would have met him in 
the field, and feels that by putting himself in his pow- 
er, he takes from him all temptation fot' using it 
against him. 

In the titlepage of Coriolanus, it is said at the 
bottom of the Dramatis Personae, " The whole histo- 
ry exactly followed, and many of the principal 
speeches copied from the life of Coriolanus in Plu° 
tarch." It will be interesting to our readers to se« 



CORIOLANUS. 91 

how far this is the case. Two of the principal scenes, 
those between Coriolanus and Aufidius, and between 
Coriolanus and his mother, are thus given in Sir 
Tliomas North's.tranalation of Plutarch, dedicated to 
Queen Elizabeth, 1579. The first is as follows : — 

" It was even twilight when he entered the city of Antium, and 
many people met him in the streets, but no man knew him. So he 
went directly to TuUus AuGdiiis's house, and when he came thither, 
he got him up straight to the chimney hearth, and sat him down, and 
spake not a word to any man, his face all muffled over. They of the 
house spying him, wondered what he should be, and yet they durst 
Hot bid him rise. For ill favouredly muffled and disguised as he was, 
yet there appeared a certain majesty in his countenance and in his 
silence : whereupon they went to Tullus, who was at suppe."-, to tell 
him of the strange disguising of this man. Tullus rose presently from 
the board, and coming towards him, asked him what he was, and 
wherefore he came. Then Martins unmuffled himself, and after he 
had paused awhile, making no answer, he said unto himself, If thoa 
knowest me not yet, Tullus, and seeing me, dost not perhaps believe 
me to be the man, I am indeed, I must of necessity discover myself to 
be that I am. ' I am Caius Martius, who hath done to thyself par- 
ticularly, and to all the Volsces generally, great hurt and mischief, 
which 1 cannot deny for my surname of Coriolanus that I bear. For 
I never had other benefit nor recompense of the true and painful ser- 
vice I have done, and the extreme dangers 1 have been in, but this 
only surname : a good memory and witness of the malice and dis- 
pleasure thou shouldest bear me. Indeed the name only remaineth 
with me ; for the rest, the envy and cruelty of the people of Rome 
have taken from me, by the sufferance of the dastardly nobility and 
magistrates, who have forsaken me, and let me be banished by the 
people. This extremity hath now driven me to come as a poor suitor, 
to take thy chimney-hearth, not of any hope I have to save my life 
thereby. For if I had feared death, 1 would not have eome hither to 
put myself in hazard : but pricked forward with desire to be revenged 
of them that thus have banished me, which now I do begin, in putting 
my person into the hands of their enemies. Wherefore if thou hast 
any heart to be wrecked of the injuries thy enemies have done thee, 
speed thee now, and let my misery serve thy turn, asd so use it as my 



S2 CORIOLANUS. 

service may be a benefit to the Volsces : promising thee, that I will 
fight with better good will for all you, than I did when I was against 
you, knowing that they fight more valiantly who know the force of 
the enemy, than such as have never proved it. And if it be so that 
thou dare not, and that thou art weary to prove fortune any more, 
then am I also weary to live any longer. And it were no wisdom in 
thee to save the life of him who hath been heretofore thy mortal 
enemy, and whose service now can nothing help, nor pleasure thee.' 
Tullus hearing what he said, was a marvellous glad man, and, taking 
him by the hand, he said unto him : ' Stand up, O Martius, and be 
of good cheer, for in proffering thyself unto us, thou doest us great 
honour : and by this means thou mayest hope also of greater things 
at all the Volsces' hands,' So he feasted him for that time, and en- 
tertained him in the honourablest manner he coold, talking with him 
of no other matter at that present : but within few days after, they 
fell to consultation together in what sort they should begin their 
wars." 

The meeting between Coriolanus and his mother 
is also nearly the same as in the play. 

" Now was Martius set then in the chair of state, with all the 
honours of a general, and when he had spied the women coming afar 
off, he marvelled what the matter meant : but afterwards knowing 
bis wife which came foremost, he determined at the first to persist in 
bis obstinate and inflexible rancour. But overcome in the end with 
natural affection, and being altogether altered to see them, his 
heart would not serve him to tarry their coming to his chair, but 
coming down in haste, he went to meet them, and first he kis?ed his 
mother, and embraced her a pretty while, then his wife and little 
children. And nature so wrcuglit with him, that the tears fell from 
his eyes, and he could not keep himself from making rouch'of them, 
but yielded to the affection of his blood, as if he had been violently 
carried with the fiiry of a most swift running stream. After he had 
thus lovingly received them, and perceiving that his mother Voluumia 
would begin to speak to him, he called the ehiefest of the council of 
the Volsces to hear what she would say. Then she spake in this 
sort: ' If we held our peace, my son, aud determined not to speak, 
the state of our poor bodies, and present sight of our raiment, would 
easily betray to Uiee what life we have led at home, siaee thy esilc 



CORIOLANUS. 93 

and abode abroad ; but think now with thyself, how much more 
unfortunate than all the women living, we are come hither, consid- 
erino that the sight which should be most pleasant to all others to 
behold, spiteful fortune had made most fearful to us : making 
myself to see my son, and my daughter here her husband, besieging 
the walls of his native country : so as that which is the only comfort 
to all others in their adversity and misery, to pray unto the God?, 
and to call to them for aid, is the only thing which plungeth us into 
most deep perplexity. For we cannot, alas, together pray, both for 
victory to our country, and for safety of thy life also: but a world 
of grievous curses, yea more than any mortal enemy can heap upon 
us, are forcibly wrapped up in our prayers. For the bitter sop of 
most hard choice is offered ihy wife and children, to forego one cf 
the two : either to lose the person of thyself, or the nurse of their 
native country. For myself, my son, I am determined not "bQ tarry 
till fortune in my lifetime do make an end of this war. For if I 
cannot persuade thee rather to do good unto both parties, than to 
overthrow and destroy the one, preferring love and nature before 
the malice and calamity of wars, thou shalt see, my son, and trust 
unto it, thou shalt no' sooner march forward to assault thy country, 
but thy foot shall tread upon thy mother's womb, that brought thee 
first into this world. And 1 may not defer to see the day, either 
that my son be led prisoner in triumph by his natural countrymen, 
or that he himself do triumph of them, and of his natural country. 
For if it were so, that my request tended to save thy country, in 
destroying the Volsces, I must confess, thou wouldest hardly and 
doubtfully resolve on that. For as to destroy thy natural country, 
it is altogether unmeet and unlawful, so were it not just and less 
honourable to betray those that put their trust in thee. But my 
only demand consisteth, to make a goal delivery of all evils, which 
delivereth equal benefit and safety, both to the one and the other, 
but most honourable for the Volsces. For it shall appear, that 
having victory in their hands, they have of special favour granted us 
singular graces, peace and amity, albeit themselves have no less part 
of both than we. Of which good, if so it came to pass, thyself is the 
only author, and so hast thou the only honour. But if it fail, and 
fall out contrary, thyself alone deservedly shalt carry the shameful 
reproach and burthen of either party. So, though the end of war be 
uncertain, yet this notwithstanding is most certain, that if it be thy 
chance to conquer, this benefit shalt ^thou reap of thy goodly coa- 



94 CORIOLANUS. 

quest, to be chronicled the plague and destroyer of thy country. 
And if fortune overthrow thee, then the world will say, that through 
desire to revenge thy private injuries, thou hast for ever undone thy 
good friends, who did most lovingly and courteously receive thee/ 
Martius gave good ear unto his mother's words, without interrupting 
her speech at all, and after she had said what she would, he held 
his peace a pretty while, and answered not a word. Hereupon she 
began again to speak unto him, and said : ' My son, why dost thou 
not answer me? Dost thou think it good altogether to give place 
unto thy choler and desire of revenge, and thinkest thou it not 
honesty for thee to grant thy mother's request in so weighty a 
cause p Dost thou take it honourable for a nobleman, to remember'^ 
the wrongs and injuries done him, and dost not in like case think it 
an honest nobleman's part to be thankful for the goodness that 
parents do shew to their children, acknowledging the duty and 
reverence they ought to bear unto them P No man living is more 
bound to shew himself thankful in all parts and respects than thyself ; 
who so universally shewest all ingratitude. Moreover, my son, thou 
hast sorely taken of thy country, exacting grievous payments upon 
them, in revenge of the injuries offered thee j besides, thou hast not 
hitherto shewed thy poor mother any courtesy. And, therefore, it is 
not only honest, but due unto me, that without compulsion 1 should 
obtain my so just and reasonable request of thee. But since by 
reason I cannot persuade thee to it, to what purpose do I defer my 
last hopep' And with these words herself, his wife and children, 
fell down upon their knees before him : Martius seeing that, could 
refrain no longer, but went straight and lifted iier up, crying out, 
' Oh mother, what have you done to me p' And holding her hard by 
the right hand, Oh mother,' said he, ' you have won a happy victory 
for your country, but mortal and unh ippy for your son : for I see 
myself vanquished by you alone.' These words being spoken openly, 
he spake a little apart with his mother and wife, and then let them 
return again to Rome, for so they did request him ; and so remain- 
ing in the camp that night, the next morning he dislodged, and 
marched homeward unto the Volsces' country again." 

Shakspeare has, in giving a dramalick form to 
tliis passage, adhered very closely and properly to 
the text. He did not think it necessary to improve 



CORIOLANUS. 95 

upon the truth of nature. Several of the scenes in 
Julius Ccesar, particularly Portia's appeal to the 
confidence of her husband by shewing him the 
wound she had given herself, and the appearance of 
the ghost of Csesar to Brutus, are, in like manner, 
taken from the history. 



TROILUS AND CRESSIDA, 



This is one of the most loose and desultory of our 
author's plays : it rambles on just as it happens, but 
it overtakes, together with some indifferent matter, 
a prodigious number of fine things in its way. Troi- 
lus himself is no character : he is merely a com- 
mon lover : but Cressida and her uncle Pandarus are 
hit off with proverbial truth. By the speeches 
given to the leaders of the Grecian host, Nestor, 
Ulysses, Agamemnon, Achilles, Shakspeare seems 
to have known them as well as if he had been a spy 
sent by the Trojans into the enemy's camp — to say 
nothing of their being very lofty examples of didac- 
tick eloquence. The following is a very stately and 
spirited declamation : 

Ulysses. Troy, yet upon her basis, had been down, 
And the great Hector's sword had lack'd a master, 
But for these instances. 
The specialty of rule hath been neglected. 

The heavens themselves, the planets, and this centre, 
Observe degree, priority, and place, 
Insisture, course, proportioD, season, form, 



TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 97 

Office, and custom, in all line of order : 
And therefore is tiie glorious planet, Sol, 
In noble eminence, enthron'd and spher'd 
Amidst the other, whose med'ciuable eye 
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil. 
And posts, like the commandment of a king. 
Sans chtck, to good and bad. But, when the planets. 
In evil mixture to disorder wander. 
What pligues and what portents p what mutinies? 
What raging of the sea ? shaking of earth ? 
Commotion in the winds p frights, changes, horrours, 
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate 
The unity and married calra of states 
Quite from their fixture .' O, when degree is shaken, 
(Which is the ladder to all high designs) 
The enterprise is sick ! How could communities, 
Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities, 
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores, 
The primogenitive and due of birth. 
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels, 
(But by degree) stand in authentick place ? 
Take but degree away, untune that string, 
And hark what discord follows ! each thing meets 
In mere oppugnancy. The bounded waters 
Would lift their bosoms higher than the shores, 
And make a sop of all this solid globe : 
Strength would be lord of imbecility. 
And the rude son would strike his father dead : 
Force would be right ; or rather, right and wrong 
(Between whose endless jar Justice resides) 
Would lose their names, and so would Justice too. 
Then every thing includes itself in power. 
Power into will, will into appetite ; 
And appetite (an universal wolf. 
So doubly seconded with will and power) 
Must make perforce an universal prey. 
And last, eat up himself. Great Agamemnon, 
This chaos, wh^n degree is suffocate, 
Follows the choking : 
And this negleciion of degree it is, 




58 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 

That by a pace goes backward, in a purpose 
It hath to climb. The general's disdained 
By him one step below j he, by the next ; 
That next, by him beneath : so every step, 
Exampled by the first pace that is sick 
Of his superiour, grows to an envious fever 
Of pale and bloodless emulation ; 
And 'tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot, 
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length, 
Troy in our weakness lives, not in her strength." 

It cannot be said of Shakspeare, as was said 
of some one, that he was " without o'erflowing full." 
He was full, even to o'erflowing. He gave heaped 
measure, running over. This was his greatest 
fault. He was only in danger " of losing dis- 
tinction in his thoughts" (to borrow his own expres- 
sion) 

" As doth a battle when they charge on heaps 
The enemy flying." 

There is another passage, the speech of Ulysses 
to Achilles, shewing him the thankless nature of 
popularity, which has a still greater depth of moral 
observation and richness of illustration than the 
former. It is long, but worth the quoting. The 
sometimes giving an entire extract from the unacted 
plays of our author may, with one class of readers, 
have almost the use of restoring a lost passage; and 
may serve to convince another class of criticks, that 
the poet's genius was not confined to the production 
of stage effect by preternv^tural means. — 

" Ulysses. Time hnth, my lord, a wallet at his back, 
Wherein he puts alms for Obiivioti ; 
A great-siz'd monster of ingratitudes : 



TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 99 

Those scraps are good deeds past, 

Which are devour'd as fast as they are made, 

Forgot as soon as done : Persev'rance, dear my lord, 

Keeps Honour bright : to have done, is to hang 

Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail 

In monumental mockery. Take the instant way ; 

For Honour travels in a strait so narrow, 

Where one but goes abreast ; keep then the path. 

For Emulation hath a thousand sons, 

That one by one pursue ; if you give way, 

Or hedge aside from the direct forth right, 

Like to an entered tide, they all rush by, 

And leave you hindmost ; 

Or, like a gallant horse fall'n in first rank, 

O'errun and trampled on : then what they do in present, 

Tho' less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours : 

For Time is like a fashionable host, 

That slightly shakes his parting guest by th' hand, 

And with his arms outstretch'd, as he would fly, 

Grasps in the comer : the Welcome ever smiles, 

And Farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek 

Remuneration for the thing it was ; for beauty, wit. 

High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service, 

Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all 

To envious and calumniating time : 

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. 

That all, with one consent, praise new born gauds, 

Tho' they are made and moulded of things past. 

The present eye praises the present object. 

Then marvel not, thou great and complete man, 

That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax ; 

Since things in motion sooner catch the eye. 

Than what not stirs. The cry went out on thee. 

And still it might, and yet it may again. 

If thou would'st not entomb thyself alive, 

And case thy reputation in thy tent." — 

The throng of images in the above lines is prodi- 
gious ; and though they sometimes jostle against one 



100 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 

another, Ihey every where raise and carry on the 
feeling, which is metaphysically true and profound. 
The debates between the Trojan chiefs on the re- 
storing of Helen are full of knowledge of human mo- 
tives and character. Troilus enters well into the 
philosophy of war, when he says in answer to soma- 
thing that falls from Hector, 

" Why there you touch'd the life of our design : 

Were it not glory that we more affected, 

Than the performance of our heaving spleens, 

I would not wish a drop of Trojan blood 

Spent more in her defence. But, worthy Hector, 

She is a theme of honour and renown, 

A spur to valiant and magnauimous deeds." 

The character of Hector, in the few slight indi- 
cations which appear of it, is made very amiable. 
His death is sublime, and shews in a striking light the 
mixture of barbarity and heroism of the age. The 
threals of Achilles are fatal ; they carry their own 
means of execution with them. 

" Come here about me, you, my Myrmidons, 
Mark what I say.— Attend me where I wheel : 
Strike not a stroke, but keep yourselves in breath ; 
And when 1 have the bloody Hector found, 
Empale him with your weapons round about : 
In fellest manner execute your arms. 
Follow me, sirs, and my proceeding eye." 

He (hen finds Hector and slays him, as if he had 
been hunting down a wild beast. There is some- 
thing revolting as well as terrifick in the ferocious 
coolness with which he singles out his prey : nor does 



TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 101 

the splendour of the achievement reconcile us to 
the cruelty of the means. 

The characters of Cressida and Pandarus are very 
amusing and instructive. The disinterested willing- 
ness of Pandarus to serve his friend in an affair which 
lies next his heart is immediately brought forward. 
*' Go thy way, Troilus, go thy way ; had I a sister 
were a Grace, or a daughter were a Goddess, he should 
take his choice. O admirable man ! Paris, Paris 
is dirt to him, and I warrant Helen, to change, 
would give mouey to boot." This is the language 
he addresses to his niece : nor is she much behind- 
hand in coming into the plot. Her head is as light 
and fluttering as her heart. " It is the prettiest 
villain, she fetches her breath so short as a new 
ta'eu sparrow." Both characters are originals, and 
quite different from what they are in Chaucer. In 
Chaucer, Cressida is represented as a grave, sober, 
considerate personage, (a widow — he cannot tell her 
age, nor whether she has children or no) who has an 
alternate eye to her character, her interest, and her 
pleasure . Shakspeare's Cressida is a giddy girl, an 
unpractised jilt, who falls in love with Troilus, as 
she afterwards deserts him, from mere levity and 
thoughtlessness of temper. She may be wooed and 
won to any thing and from any thing, at a moment's 
warning : the other knows very well what she would 
be at, and sticks to it, and is more governed by sub- 
stantial reasons than by caprice or vanity. Panda- 
rus again, in Chaucer's story, is a friendly sort of go- 
between, tolerably busy, officious, and forward in 
bringing matters to bear : but in Shakspeare he has 
9 * 



102 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 

" a stamp exclusive and professional :" he wears the 
badge of his trade ; he is a regular knight of the 
game. The difference of the manner in which the 
subject is treated arises perhaps less from intention, 
than from the different genius of the two poets. 
There is no double entendre in the characters of 
Chaucer : they are either quite serious or quite co- 
mick. In Shakspeare the ludicrous and ironical are 
constantly blended with the stately and the impas- 
sioned. We see Chaucer's characters as they saw 
themselves, not as they appeared to others or might 
have appeared to the poet. He is as deeply impli- 
cated in the affairs of his personages as they could 
be themselves. He had to go a long journey with 
each of them, and became a kind of necessary confi- 
dant. There is little relief, or light and shade in his 
pictures. The conscious smile is not seen lurking 
under the brow of grief or impatience. Every thing 
with him is intense and continuous — a working out 
of what went before. — Shakspeare never committed 
himself to his characters. He trilled, laughed, or 
wept with them as he chose. He has no prejudices 
for or against them ; and it seems a matter of perfect 
indifference whether he shall be in jest or earnest. 
According to him " the web of our lives is of a min- 
gled yarn, good and ill together." His genius was 
dramatick, as Chaucer's was historical. He saw 
both sides of a question, the different views taken of 
it according to the different interests of the parties 
concerned, and he was at once an actor afid spectator 
in thp scene. If any thing, he is too various and 
flexible ; too full of transitions, of glancing lights, of 



TROrLUS AND CRESSIDA. 103 

salient points. If Chaucer followed up his subject 
too doggedly, perhaps Shakspeare was too volatile 
and heedless. The Muse's win^ too often lifted him 
off his feet. He made infinite excursions to the 
right and the left. 



He hath done 



Mad and fantasticlc expoutlon, 

Engaging and redeemino; of himself 

With such a cart'less force and forceless care, 

As if that hick in very spite of cunning 

Bade hiai win all." 

Chaucer attended chiefly to Ihe real and natural, 
that is, to the involuntary and inevitable impressions 
on Ihe mind in g;iven circumstances: Shakspeare ex- 
hibited also the possible and the fantastical, — not 
only what things are in themselves, hut whatever 
they misjht seem to be, their different reflections, 
their endless combinations. He lent his fancy, wit, 
invention, to others, and borrowed their feelings in 
return. Chaucer excelled in the force of habitual 
sentiment ; Shakspeare added to it every variety of 
passion, every suggestion of thought or accident. 
Chaucer described external objects with the eye of a 
painter, or he might be said to have embodied them 
with the hand of a sculptor, every part is so 
thoroughly made out, and tangible : — Shakspeare-s 
imagination threw over them a lustre 

— " Prouder than when blue Iris bends.'* , 

Every thing in Chaucer has a downright reality, 
A simile or a sentiment is as if if were sriven in upon 
evidence. In Shakspeare the commonest matter of 



104 TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 

fact has a romantick grace about it; or seems to 
float with the breath of imagination in a freer 
element. No one could have more depth of feeling 
or observation than Chaucer, but he wanted resour- 
ces of invention to lay open the stores of nature or 
the human heart with the same radiant light, that 
Shakspeare has done. However fine or profound the 
thought, we know what is coming, whereas the effect 
of reading Shakspeare is " like the eye of vassalage 
encountering majesty." Chaucer's mind was conse- 
cutive, rather than discursive. He arrived at truth 
through a certain process ; Shakspeare saw every 
thing by intuition. Chaucer had great variety of 
power, but he could do only one thing at once. He 
set himself to w^ork on a particular subject. His 
ideas were kept separate, labelled, ticketed, and 
parcelled out in a set form, in pews and compart- 
ments by themselves. They did not play into one 
another's hands. They did not re-act upon one 
another, as the blower's breath moulds the yielding 
glass. There is something hard and dry in them. 
What is the most wonderful thing in Shakspeare's 
faculties is their excessive sociability, and how they 
gossiped and compared notes together. 

We must conclude this criticism ; and we will do 
it with a quotation or two. One of the most 
beautiful passages in Chaucer's tale is the description 
of Cresseide's first avowal of her love. 

" And as the new abashed nightingale, 
That stinteth first when she beginneth sing, 
When that she heareth any herde's tale, 
Or in the hedges any wight stirring, 



TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. 105 

And, after, sicker doth her voice outring ; 
Right so Cresseide, when that her dread stent, 
Opened her heart, and told him her intent." 

See also the two next stanzas, and particularly 
that divine one beginning 

" Her armes small, her back both straight and soft," &c. 

Compare this with the following speech of Troilus 
to Cressida in the play : 

" O, that I thought it could be in a woman ; 
And if it can, I will presume in you, 
To feed for aye her lamp and flame of love, 
To keep her constancy in plight and youth, 
Outliving beauties outward, with a mind 
That doth renew swifter than blood decays. 
Or, that persiiasion could but thus convince me, 
That my integrity and truth to you 
Might be affronted with the match and weight 
Of such a winnow'd purity in love; 
How were I then uplifted ! But alas, 
I am as true as Truth's simplicity, 
And simpler than the infancy of Truth." 

These passages may not seem very characteristick 
at first sight, though we think they are so. We will 
give two, that cannot be mistaken. Patroclus says 
to Achilles, 

" Rouse yourself; and the weak wanton Cupid 

Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold, 
And like a dewdrop from the lion's mane, 
Be shook to air." 

Troilus, addressing the God of Day on the ap- 
proach of the morning that parts him from Cressida, 
says with much scorn, 



106 TRGILUS AND CRESSIDA. 

" What ! proffer'st thou thy light here for to sell ? 
Go, sell it then) that snoalle sel§s grave." 

If nobody but Sbakspeare could have written 
the former, nobody but Chaucer would have thought 
of the latter.— Chaucer is the most literal of poets, 
as Richardson is of prose writers. 



ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 



This is a very noble play. Though not in the first 
class of Shakspeare's productions, it stands next to 
them, and is, we think, the finest of his historical 
plays, that is, of those in which he made poetry 
the organ of history, and assumed a certain tone 
of character and sentiment, in conformity to known 
facts, instead of trusting to his observations of ge- 
neral nature or to the unlimited indulgence of his 
own fancy. What he has added to the history, is 
upon a par vi'ith it. His genius was, as it were, a 
match for history as well as nature, and could grap- 
ple at will with either. This play is full of that 
pervading comprehensive power by which the po^t 
could always make himself master of time and cir- 
cumstances. It presents a fine picture of Roman 
pride and Eastern magnificence : and in the struggle 
between the two, the empire of the world seems sus- 
pended, " like the swan's down' feather, 

" That stands upon the swell at full of tide, 
And neither way inclines." 



108 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 

The characters breathe, move, and live. Shak- 
speare does not stand reasoning on what his charac- 
ters would do or say, but at once becomes them, and 
speaks and acts for them. He does not present 
us with groups of stage puppets or poetical ma- 
chines making set speeches on human life, and acting 
from a calculation of ostensible motives, but he 
brings living men and women on the scene, who 
speak and act from real feelings, according to the 
ebbs and flows of passion, without the least tincture 
of pedantry of logick or rhetorick. Nothing is 
made out by inference and analogy, by climax and 
antithesis, but every thing takes place just as it 
would have done in reality, according to the occa- 
sion. — The character of Cleopatra is a master- 
piece. What an extreme contrast it affords to 
Imogen ! One would think it almost impossible for 
the same person to have drawn both. She is volup- 
tuous, ostentatious, conscious, boastful of her charms, 
haughty, tyrannical, fickle. The luxurious pomp 
and gorgeous extravagance of the Egyptian queen 
are displayed in all their force and lustre, as well 
as the irregular grandeur of the soul of Blark An- 
tony. Take only the first four lines that they 
speak, as an example of the regal style of love- 
making. 

" Cleopatra, If it be love, indeed, tell me how much? 
Antony. There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd. 
Cleopatra. I'll set a bourn how far to he belov'd. 
Antony. Then must thou needs find out new heav'n, new 
earth." 



ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 109 

The rich and poetical description of her person, 
beginning — 

" The barge she sat in, like a biirnish'd throne, 
Burnt on the water ; the poop was beaten gold, 
Purple tlie sails, and so perfumed, that 
The winds were lovesick" — 

seeofis to prepare the way for, and almost to jus- 
tify, the subsequent infatuation of Antony when 
in the seafight at Actium, he leaves the battle, 
and, " like a doating mallard," follows her flying 
sails. 

Few things in Shakspeare (and we know of 
nothing in any other author like them) have 
more of that local truth of imagination and cha- 
racter than the passage in which Cleopatra is 
represented conjecturing what were the employ- 
ments of Antony in his absence. " He's speak- 
ing now, or murmuring — Where's my serpent of 
old Nile?'''* Or again, when she says to Antony, 
after the defeat at Actium, and his summoning 
up resolution to risk another fight — " It is my birth- 
day ; I had thought to have held it poor ; but since 
my lord is Antony again, I will be Cleopatra." 
Perhaps the finest burst of all is Antony's rage 
after his final defeat when he comes in, and sur- 
prises the messenger of Caesar kissing her hand — 

" To let a fellow that will take rewards, 
And say, God quit you, be familiar with, 
My playfellow, your hand j this kingly seal, 
And plighter of high hearts." 

It is no wonder that he orders him to be whipped J 
10 



no AxNTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 

but his low condition is not the true reason : there 
is another feeling which lies deeper, though Anto- 
ny's pride would not let him shew it, except by 
his rage; he suspects the fellow to be Caesar's 
proxy. 

Cleopatra's whole character is the triumph of 
the voluptuous, of the love of pleasure and the 
power of giving it, over every other consideration. 
Octavia is a dull foil to her, and Fulvia a shrew 
and shrill-tongued. What a picture do those lines 
give of her — 

" Age cannot wither lier, nor custom steal 
Her infinite variety. Other women cloy 
The appetites they feed, but she mates hungry 
Where most she satisfies." 

What a spirit and fire in her conversation with 
Antony's messenger who brings her the unwelcome 
news of his marriage with Octavia ! How all the 
pride of beauty and of high rank breaks out in her 
promised reward to him — 

" There's gold, and here 

My bluest veins to kiss !" — 

She had great and unpardonable faults, but the 
beauty of her death almost redeems them. She 
learns from the depth of despair and strength of her 
affections. She keeps her queen-like state in the 
last disgrace, and her sense of the pleasurable in the 
last moments of her life. She tastes a luxury in 
death. After applying the asp, she says with fond- 
ness— 



ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. HI 

** Dost thou not see my baby at my breast, 
That sucks the nurse asleep ? 
As sweet as balm, as soft as air, as gentle. 
Oh Antony !" 

It is worth while to observe that Shakspeare has 
contrasted the extreme magnificence of the descrip- 
tions in this play with pictures of extreme suffering 
and physical horrour, not less striking — partiy per- 
haps to excuse the effeminacy of Mark Antony to 
whom they are related as having happened, but 
more to preserve a certain balance of feeling in the 
mind. Caesar says, hearing of his conduct at the 
court of Cleopatra, 



Antony, 



Leave thy lascivious wassels. When thou once 

Wert beaten frona Mutina, where thou slew'st 

Hirtiu3 and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel 

Did famine follow, whom thou fought'st against. 

Though daintily brought up, with patience more 

Than savages could suffer. Thou didst diink 

The stale of horses, and the gilded puddle 

Which beast would cough at. Thy palate then did deign 

The roughest berry on the rudest hedge, 

Yea, like the stag, when snow the pasture sheets, 

The barks of trees thou browsed'st. On tlie Alps, 

It is reported, thou didst eat strange flesh. 

Which some did die to' look on: and all this, 

It wounds thine honour, that I speak it now, 

Was borne so like a soldier, that thy cheek 

So much as lank'd not." 

The passage after Antony's defeat by Augustus, 
where he is made to say — 

" Yes, yes ; he at Philippi kept 

His sword e'en like a dancer ; while I struck 



112 ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 

The lean and crinkled Cassius, and 'twas I 
That the mad Brutus ended"— 

is one of those fine retrospections which shew us the 
winding and eventful march of human life. The 
jealous attention which has been paid to the unities 
both of time and place has taken away the princi- 
ple of perspective in the drama, and all the interest 
which objects derive from distance, from contrast, 
from privation, from change of fortune, from long 
cherished passion ; and contracts our view of life 
from a strange and romaatick dream, long, obscure, 
and infinite, into a smartly contested, three hours' 
inaugural disputation on its merits by the different 
candidates for theatrical applause. 

The latter scenes of Antony and Cleopatra 
are full of the changes of accident and passion. 
Success and defeat follow one another with start- 
ling rapidity. Fortune sits upon her wheel more 
blind and giddy than usual. This precarious state 
and the approaching dissolution of his greatness are 
strikingly displayed in the dialogue between Antony 
and Eros. 

" Antony. Eros, thou yet behold'st me ? 

Eros. Ay, noble lord. 

Antony. Sometime we see a cloud that's dragonisli, 
A vapour sometime, like a bear or lion, 
A towered citadel, a pendant rock, 
A forked mountain, or blue promontory 
With trees upon't, that nod unto the world 
And mock our eyes with air. Tliou hast seen these signs, 
They are black vesper's pageants. 

Eros. Ay, my lord. 

Antony. That which is now a horse, even with a thought 
The rack dislimns, and make it indistinct 



ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. 113 

As water is in water. 

Eros. It does, my lord. 

Antony. My good knave, Eros, now tliy captain is 
Even such a body," &c. 

This is, without doubt, one of the finest pieces of 
poetry in Shakspeare. The splendour of the image- 
ry, the semblance of reality, the lofty range of pic- 
turesque objects hanging over the world, their evan- 
escent nature, the total uncertainty of what is left 
behind, are just like the mouldering schemes of hu- 
man greatness. It is finer than Cleopatra's passion- 
ate lamentation over his fallen grandeur, because it 
is more dim, unstable, unsubstantial. Antony's 
headstrong presumption and infatuated determina- 
tion to yield to Cleopatra's wishes to fight by sea 
instead of land, meet a merited punishment; and 
the extravagance of his resolutions, increasing with 
the desperateness of his circumstances, is well com- 
mented upon by CEnobarbus. 



" I see men's judgments are 



A parcel of their fortunes, and things outward 
Do draw the inward quality after them 
To suffer all alike." 

The repentance of CEnobarbus after his treachery 
to his master is the most affecting part of the [day. 
He cannot recover from the blow which Antony's 
generosity gives him, and he dies broken hearted 
" a master leaver and a fugitive." 

Shakspeare's genius has spread over the whole play 
a richness like the overflowing of the Nile. 
10 * 



HAMLET. 



This is that Hamlet the Dane, whom we read of ia 
our youth, and whom we seem almost to remember 
in our after years ; he who made that famous solilo- 
quy on life, who gave the advice to the players, who 
thought " this goodly frame, the earth, a steril pro- 
montory, and this brave o'erhanging firmament, the 
air, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, 
a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours ;" 
whom " man delighted not, nor woman neither ;" 
he who talked with the gravediggers, and moraliz- 
ed on Yorick's skull ; the schoolfellow of Rosen- 
craus and Guildenstern at Wittenberg; the friend of 
Horatio; the lover of Ophelia; he that was mad 
and sent to England : the slow avenger of his fa- 
ther'*s death; who lived at the court of Horwendillus 
five hundred years before we were born, but all 
whose thoughts we seem to know as well as we do 
our own, because we have read them in Shak- 
speare. 

Hamlet is a name : his speeches and sayings but 
the idle coinage of the poet's brain. What then, are 



HAMLET. 115 

they not real ? They are as real as our own thoughts. 
Their reality is in the reader's mind. It is rve who 
are Hamlet. This play has a prophetick truth, 
which is above that of history. Whoever has be- 
come thoughtful and melancholy, through his own 
mishaps or those of others ; whoever has borne about 
with him the clouded brow of reflection, and thought 
himself " too much i' th' sun ;" whoever has seen 
the golden lamp of day dimmed by envious mists 
rising in his own breast, and could find in the world 
before him only a dull blank with nothing left re- 
markable in it ; whoever has known " the pangs of 
despised love, the insolence of office, or the spurns 
which patient merit of the unworthy takes ;" he who 
has felt his mind sink within him, and sadness cling 
to his heart like a malady, who has had his hopes 
blighted and his youth staggered by the appari- 
tions of strange things ; who cannot be well at 
ease, while he sees evil hovering near him like 
a spectre ; whose powers of action have been eaten 
up by thought, he to whom the universe seems 
infinite, and himself nothing ; whose bitterness of 
soul makes him careless of consequences, and 
who goes to a play as his best resource to shove 
off, to a second remove, the evils of life by a 
mock representation of them — this is the true Ham- 
let. 

We have been so used to this tragedy that we 
hardly know how to criticise it any more than we 
should know how to describe our own faces. But 
we must make such observations as we can. It is 
the one of Shakspeare's plays that we think of 



116 HAMLET. 

oftenest, because it abounds most in striking reflec- 
tions on human life, and because the distresses of 
Hamlet are transferred, by the turn of his mind, to 
the general account of humanity. Whatever hap- 
pens to him, we apply to ourselves, because he 
applies it so himself as a means of general reason- 
ing. He is a great moralizer ; and what makes him 
worth attending to is, that he moralizes on his own 
feelings and experience. He is not a common- 
place pedant. If Lear shews the greatest depth of 
passion, Hamlet is the most remarkable for the in- 
genuity, originality, and unstudied development of 
character. Shakspeare had more magnanimity than 
any other poet, and he has shewn more of it in this 
play than in any other. There is no attempt to 
force an interest: every thing is left for time and 
circumstances to unfold. The attention is excited 
without effort, the incidents succeed each other as 
matters of course, the characters think, and speak, 
and act, just as they might do, if left entirely to 
themselves. There is no set purpose, no straining 
at a point. The observations are suggested by the 
passing scene — the gusts of passion come and go 
like sounds of musick borne on the wind. The 
whole play is an exact transcript of what might be 
supposed to have taken place at the court of Den- 
mark, at the remote period of time lixed upon, before 
the modern refinements in morals and manners were 
heard of. It would have been interesting enough to 
have been admitted as a by-stander in such a scene, 
at such a time, to have heard and seen something of 
what was going on. But here we are more than 



HAMLET. 117 

spectators. "We have not only " the outward pa- 
geants and the signs of grief;" but "we have that 
within which passes shew." We read the thoughts 
of the heart, we catch the passions living as they 
rise. Other dramalick writers give us very fine 
versions and paraphrases of nature: but Shakspeare, 
together with his own comments, gives us the origi- 
nal text, that we may judge for ourselves. This is 
a very great advantage. 

The character of Hamlet is itself a pure effusion 
of genius. It is not a character marked by strength 
of will or even of passion, but by refinement of 
thought and sentiment. Hamlet is as little of the 
hero as a man can well be : but he is a young and 
princely novice, full of high enthusiasm and quick 
sensibility — the sport of circumstances, questioning 
with fortune and refining on his own feelings, and 
forced from the natural bias of his disposition by the 
strangeness of his situation. He seems incapable of 
deliberate action, and is only hurried into extremi- 
ties on the spur of the occasion, when he has no time 
to reflect, as in the scene where he kills Polonius, 
and again, where he alters the letters which Rosen- 
craus and Guildenstern are taking with them to En- 
gland, purporting his death. At other times, when 
he is most bound to act, he remains puzzled, unde- 
cided, and skeptical, dallies with his purposes, till 
the occasion is lost, and always finds some pretence 
to relapse into indolence and thoughtfulness again. 
For this reason he refuses to kill the King when he 
is at his prayers, and by a refinement in malice, 
which is in truth only an excuse for his own want of 



118 HAMLET. 

resolution, defers his reveage to some more fatal 
opportunity, when he shall be engaged in some act 
" that has no relish of salvation in it." 

'* He kneels and pray?, 

And now I'll do't, and so he goes to heaven, 

And so am I reveng'd : Vuil txould be scami'd. 

He kill'd ray father, and for that, 

I, his sole son, send him to heaven. 

Why, this is reward, not revenge. 

Up sword and know thou a more horrid' time, 

When he is drunk, asleep, or in a rage." 

He is the prince of philosophical speculators, and 
because he cannot have his revenge perfect, ac- 
cording to the most refined idea his wish can form» 
he misses it altogether. So he scruples to trust the 
suggestions of the Ghost, contrives the scene of the 
play to have surer j^roof of his uncle's guilt, and 
then rests satisfied with this confirmation of his sus- 
picions, and the success of his experiment, instead 
of acting upon it. Yet he is sensible of his own 
weakness, taxes himself with it, and tries to reason 
himself out of it. 

" How all occasions do inform against me, 
And spur my dull revenge ! What is a man, 
If his chief good and market of his time 
Be but to sleep and feed ? A beast ; no more. 
Sure he that made us with such large discourse. 
Looking before and after, gave us not 
That capability and godlike reason 
To rust in us unus'd : now whether it be 
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple 
Of thinking too precisely on th' event, — 
A thought which quartered, hath but one part wisdona, 
And ever three parts coward ;— I do not know 



HAMLET. 119 

Why yet I live to say, this thing's to do; 

Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means 

To do it. Examples gross as earth excite me : 

Witness this army of such mass and charge. 

Led by a delicate and tender prince, 

Whose spirit with divine ambition pufTd, 

Makes mouths at the invisible event. 

Exposing what is mortal and unsure 

To all that fortune, death, and danger dare, 

Even from an eggshell. 'Tis not to be great. 

Never to stir without great argument ; 

But greatly to find quarrel in a strav*', 

When honour's at the stake. How stand I then, 

That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd, 

Excitements of my reason and my blood, 

And let all sleep, while to my shame I see 

The imminent death of twenty thousand men, 

That for a fantasy and trick of fame. 

Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot 

Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause, 

Which is not tomb enough and continent 

To hide the slain ? — O, from this time forth, 

My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth." 

Still he does nothing; and this very speculation on 
his own infirmity only affords him another occasion 
for indulging it. It is not for any want of attachment 
to his father or abhorrence of his murder that Hamlet 
is thus dilatory, but it is more to his taste to indulge 
his imagination in reflecting upon the enormity of 
the crime and refining on his schemes of vengeance, 
than to put them into immediate practice. His ru- 
ling passion is to think, not to act : and any vague 
pretence that flatters this propensity instantly diverts 
him from his previous purposes. 



120 HAMLET. 

The moral perfection of this character has been 
called in question, we think, by those who did not 
understand it. It is more interesting than according 
to rules : amiable, though not faultless. The ethical 
delineations of " that noble and liberal casuist" (as 
Shakspeare has been well called) do not exhibit the 
drab-coloured quakerism of morality. His plays 
are not copied either from The Whole Duty of Man, 
or from The Academy of Compliments ! We con- 
fess, we are a little shocked at the want of refinement 
in those who are shocked at the want of refinement 
in Hamlet. The want of punctilious exactness in 
his behaviour either partakes of the " license of the 
time," or else belongs to the very excess of intellec- 
tual refinement in the character, which makes the 
common rules of life, as well as his own purposes, 
sit loose upon him. He may be said to be amenable 
only to the tribunal of his own thoughts, and is too 
much taken up with the airy world of contemplation 
to lay as much stress as he ought on the practical 
consequences of things. His habitual principles of 
action are unhinged and out of joint with the time. 
His conduct to Ophelia is quite natural in his circum- 
stances. It is that of assumed severity only. It 
is the effect of disappointed hope, of bitter regrets. 
of affection suspended, not obliterated, by the dis- 
tractions of the scene around him! Amidst the na- 
tural and preternatural horrours of his situation, he 
might be excused in delicacy from carrying on a 
regular courtship. When " his father's spirit was in 
arms," it was not a time for the son to make love in. 
He could neither marry Ophelia, nor wound her mind 



HAMLET. 121 

by explaining the cause of his alienation, which 
he durst hardly trust himself to think of. It would 
have taken him years to have come to a direct 
explanation on the point. In the harrassed state of 
his mind, he could not have done otherwise than he 
did. His conduct does not contradict what he says 
when he sees her funeral, 

" I loved Ophelia : forty thousand brothers 
Could not with all their quantity of love 
Make up my sura." 

Nothing can be more affecting or beautiful than 
the Queen's apostrophe to Ophelia on throwing flow- 
ers into the grave. 



' Sweets to the sweet, farewell. 



I hop'd thou should 'st have been my Hamlet's wife : 
I thought thy bridebed to have deck'd, sweet maid, 
And not have strew'd thy grave." 

Shakspeare was thoroughly a master of the mixed 
motives of human character, and he here shews us 
the Queen, who was so criminal in some respects, 
not without sensibility and affection in other rela- 
tions of life.— Ophelia is a character almost too 
exquisitely touching to be dwelt upon. Oil rose of 
May, oh flower too soon faded ! Her love, her mad- 
ness, her death, are described with the truest 
touches of tenderness and pathos. It is a character 
which nobody but Shakspeare could have drawn in 
the way that he has done, and to the conception of 
which there is not even the smallest approach, 
11 



J 22 HAMLET. 

except in some of the old romantick ballads. Her 
brother, Laertes, is a character we do not like so 
well : he is too hot and cholerick, and somewhat 
rodomontade. Polonius is a perfect character in 
its kind ; nor is there any foundation for the objec- 
tions which have been made to the consistency of 
this part. It is said that he acts very foolishly and 
talks very sensibly. There is no inconsistency in 
that. Again, that he talks wisely at one time and 
foolishly at another ; that his advice to Laertes is 
very sensible, and his advice to the King and Queen 
on the subject of Hamlet's madness very ridiculous. 
But he gives the one as a father, and is sincere in it ; 
he gives the other as a mere courtier, a busybody, 
and is accordingly officious, garrulous, and imperti- 
nent. In short, Shakspeare has been accused of 
inconsistency in this and other characters, only be- 
cause h« has kept up the distinction which there is 
in nature, between the understandings and the moral 
habits of men, between the absurdity in their ideas 
and the absurdity of their motives. Polonius is not 
a fool, but he makes himself so. His folly, whether 
in his actions or speeches, comes under the head of 
impropriety of intention. 

We do not like to see our author's plays acted, 
and least of all, Hamlet. There is no play that 
suffers so much in being transferred to the stage. 
Hamlet himself seems hardly capable of being act- 
ed. Mr. Kemble unavoidably fails in this charac- 
ter from want of ease and variety. The charac- 
ter of Hamlet is made up of undulating lines; it 
has the yielding flexibility of a " a wave o' th' sea." 



HAIVHuET. 123 

Mr. Kemble plays it like a man in armour, with a 
determined inveteracy of purpose, in one undeviat- 
ing straight line, which is as remote from the natu- 
ral grace and refined susceptibility of the character, 
as the sharp angles and abrupt starts which Mr. 
Kean introduces into the part. Mr. Kean's Ham- 
let is as much to splenetick and rash as Mr. Kem- 
ble's is too deliberate and formal. His manner is 
too strong and pointed. He throws a severity, 
approaching to virulence, into the common obser- 
vations and answers. There is nothing of this in 
Hamlet. He is, as it were, wrapped up in his re~ 
flections, and only thinks aloud. There should 
therefore be 'no attempt to impress what he says 
upon others by a studied exaggeration of emphasis 
or manner ; no talking at his hearers. There should 
be as much of the gentleman and scholar as possi- 
ble infused into the part, and as little of the actor. 
A pensive air of sadness should sit reluctantly 
upon his brow, but no appearance of fixed and 
sullen gloom. He is full of weakness and melan- 
choly, but there is no harshness in his nature. He 
is the most amiable of misanthropes. 



THE TEMPEST. 



A'here can be little doubt that Shakspeare was the 
most universal genius that ever lived. " Either for 
tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, 
hi&torical-pastoral, scene individable, or poem unli- 
mited, he is the only man. Seneca cannot be too 
heavy, nor Plautus too light for him." He has not 
only the same absolute command over our laughter 
and our tears, all the resources of passion, of wit, 
of thought, of observation, but he has the most un 
bounded range of fanciful invention, whether terri 
ble or playful, the same insight into the world of 
imagination that he has into the world of reality 
and over all there presides the same truth of cha 
racter and nature, and the same spirit of humanity 
His ideal beings are as true and natural as his^ real 
characters; that is, as consistent with themselves, 
or if we suppose such beings to exist at all, they 
could not act, speak, or' feel otherwise than as he 
makes them. He has invented for them a language, 
manners, and sentiments of their own, from the tcp- 
mendous imprecations of the Witches in Macbeth, 



THE TEMPEST. 125 

when they do " a deed without a name," to the 
sylph-like expressions of Ariel, who " does his 
spiriting gently ;" the mischievous trichs and gossip- 
ing of Robin Goodfellow, or the uncouth gabbling 
and emphatick gesticulations of Caliban In this 
play. 

The Tempest is one of the most original and 
perfect of Shakspeare's productions, and he has 
shewn in it all the variety of his powers. It is full 
of grace and grandeur. The human and imagina- 
ry characters, the dramatick and the grotesque, are 
blended together with the greatest art^ and w ithout 
any appearance of it. Though he has here given 
" to airy nothing a local habitation and a name," 
yet that part which is only the fanlastick creation 
of his mind, has the same palpable texture, and co- 
heres " semblably" with the rest. As the preter- 
natural part has the air of reality, and almost haunts 
the imagination with a sense of truth, the real cha- 
racters and events partake of the wildness of a dream. 
The stately magician, Prospero, driven from his 
dukedom, but around whom (so potent is his art) 
airy spirits throng numberless to do his bidding ; 
his daughter Miranda (" worthy of that name") to 
whom all the power of his art points, and who 
seems the goddess of the isle; the princely Ferdi- 
nand, cast by fate upon the haven of his happiness 
in this idol of his love; the delicate Ari(;I; the 
savage Caliban, half brute, half demon ; the drunk- 
en ship's crew — are all connected parts of the story, 
and can hardly be spared from the place they fill. 
Even the local scenery is of a piece and charac- 
11* 



126 THE TEMPEST. 

ter with the subject. Prospero's enchanted island 
seems to have risen up out of the sea ; the airy musick, 
the tempest-tost vessel, the turbulent waves, ail have 
the effect of the landscape background of some fine 
picture. Shakspeare's pencil is (to use an allusion 
of his own) " like the dyer*s hand, subdued to what 
it works in." Every thing in him, though it par- 
takes of " the liberty of wit," is also subjected to 
" the law" of the understanding. For instance, 
even the drunken sailors, who are made reeling-ripe, 
share in the disorder of their minds and bodies, in 
the tumult of the elements, and seem on shore to be 
as much at the mercy of chance as they were before 
at the mercy of the winds and waves. These fel- 
lows, with their sea wit, are the least to our taste of 
any part of the play : but they are as like drunken 
sailors as they can be, and are an indirect foil to 
Caliban, whose figure acquires a classical dignity in 
the comparison. 

The character of Caliban is generally thought 
(and justly so) to be one of the author's masterpieces. 
It is not, indeed, pleasant to see this character on 
the stage, any more than it is to see the God Pan 
personated there. But in ilself it is one of the wild- 
est and most abstracted of all Shakspeare's characters, 
whose deformity, whether of body or mind, is redeem- 
ed by the power and truth of the imagination dis^ 
played in it. It is the essence of grossness, but 
there is not a particle of vulgarity in it. Shakspeare 
has described the brutal mind of Caliban in contact 
with the pure and original forms of nature ; the cha- 
racter grows out of the soil where it is rooted uu- 



THE TEMPEST. 127 

controled, uncouth and wild, uncramped by any of 
the meannesses of custom. It is " of the earth, 
earthy." It seems almost to have been dug out of 
the ground, with a soul instinctively superadded to 
it answering to its wants and origin. Vulgarity is 
not natural coarseness, but conventional coarseness, 
learnt from others, contrary to, or without an entire 
conformity of natural power and disposition ; as 
fashion is the commonplace affectation of what is 
elegant and refined without any feeling of the es- 
sence of it. Schiegel, the admirable German cri- 
tick on Shakspeare, observes, that Caliban is a po- 
etical character, and "always speaks in blank verse." 
He first comes in thus : 

•' Caliban. As wicked dew as e'er my mother briish'd 
With raven's feather from unwliolesome fen, 
Drop on you both : a southvi'est blow on ye. 
And blister you all o'er ! 

Prospero. For this, be sure, to night thou shall have cramps, 
Side-sliches that shall pen thy breath up ; urchins 
Shall for that vast of night that they may work, 
All exercise on thee : thou shalt be pinch'd 
As thick as honey combs, each pinch more stinging 
Than bees that made 'em. 

Caliban. I must eat my dinner. 
This island's mine by Sycorax my mother, 
Which thou tak'st from me. When thou earnest first, 
Thou stroak'dst me, and mad'st much of me ; would'st give me 
Water with berries in't ; and teach me how 
To name the bigger light, and how the less 
That burn by day and night ; and then I lov'd thee, 
And shew'd thee all the qualities o' th' isle. 
The fresh springs, brine-pits, barren place and fertile: 
Curs'd be I that I did so ! All the charms 
Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you ! 



128 THE TEMPEST. 

For I am all the subjects that you have, 
Who first was mine own king ; and here you sty me 
In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me 
The rest o' th' island. 

And again, he promises Trinculo his services thus, 
if he will free him from his drudgery. 

*' I'll shew thee the best springs : I'll pluck thee berries, 
I'll i5sh for thee, and get tJ)ee wood enough. 
I pr'ythee let me bring thee where crabs grow, 
And I, with my long nails, will dig thee pig nuts : 
Shew thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how 
To snare the nimble marmozet : I'll bring thee 
To clust'ring filberds ; and sometimes I'll get thee 
Young scamels from the rock." 

In conducting Stephano and Trinculo to Prospe- 
ro's cell, Caliban shews the superiority of natural 
capacity over greater knowledge and greater folly ; 
and in a former scene, when Ariel frightens them 
with his rausick, Caliban, to encourage them, ac- 
counts for it in the eloquent poetry of the senses. 

— " Be not afraid, the isle is full of noises, 

Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not. 

Sometimes a thousand twanging instruments 

Will hum about mine ears, and sometimes voices, 

That if I then had waked after long sleep. 

Would make me sleep again ; and then in dreaming. 

The clouds methought would open, and shew riches 

Ready to drop upon me : when I wak'd 

1 cried to dream again." 

This is not more beautiful than it is true. The 
poet here shews us the savage with the simplicity of 
a child, and makes the strange monster amiable. 
Shakspeare had to paint the human animal rude and 



THE TEMPEST. 129 

without choice in its pleasures, but not without the 
sense of pleasure or some germ of the affections. 
Master Barnardine in Measure for Measure^ the sav- 
age of civilized life, is an admirable philosophical 
counterpart to Caliban. 

Shakspeare has, as it were by design, drawn off 
from Caliban the elements of whatever is ethereal 
and refined, to compound them in the unearthly 
mould of Ariel. Nothing was ever more finely con- 
ceived than this contrast between the material and 
the spiritual, the gross and delicate. Ariel is ima- 
ginary power, the swiftness of thought personified. 
When told to make good speed by Prospero, he 
says, " I drink the air before me." This is some- 
thing like Puck's boast on a similar occasion, " I'll 
put a girdle round about the earth in forty minutes.'* 
But Ariel differs from Puck in having a fellow feel- 
ing in the interests of those he is employed about. 
How exquisite is the following dialogue between him 
and Prospero ! 

** And. Your charm so strongly works 'em, 
That if you now beheld them, your affections 
Would become tender. 

Prospero. Dost thou think so, spirit p 

Jrid. Mine would, sir, were I human. 

Prospero. And mine shall. 
Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling 
Of their afflictions, and shall not myself, 
One of their kind, that relish all as sharply, 
Passion'd as they, be kindlier moved than thou art p" 

It has been observed that there is a peculiar charm 
in the songs introduced in Shakspeare, which, with- 
out conveying any distinct images, seem to recall 



130 THE TEMPEST. 

all the feelings connected wi<h them, like snatches of 
half-forgotten musick heard indistinctly and at in- 
tervals. There is this effect produced by Ariel's 
songs, which (as we are told) seem to sound iu the 
air, and us if the person playing them were invisi- 
ble. We shall give one instance out of many of this 
general power. 

" Enter Ferdinand j and Ariel, invisible, playing and singii^. 

ARIEL'S SONG. 

Come unto these yellow sands, 

And then take hands ; 

Curt'«ied when you have, and kiss'd, 

(The wild waves whist ;) 

Foot it featly here and there ; 

And sweet sprites the burden bear. 

[Burden dispersedly. 

Hark, hark ! bowgh wowgh : the watch dogs bark, 
Bowg wowgh. 
Ariel. Hark, hark .' I hear 

The strain of strutting chanticleer 
Cry cock- a doodle- doo. 

Ferdinand. Where should this musick be ? in air or earth ? 
It sounds no more : and sure it waits upon 
Some god o' th' island. Sitting on a bank 
Weeping against the king my father's wreck, 
This musick crept by me upon the waters, 
Allaying both their fury and my passion 
With its sweet air ; thence I have follow'd it, 
Or it hath drawn me rather :— but 'tis gone. — 
No, it begins again. 

ARIEL'S SONG. 
Full fathom five thy father lies. 

Of his bones are coral made : 
Those are pearls that were his eyes, 

Nothing of him that doth fade, 



THE TEMPEST. 13l 

But doth suffer a sea change, 
Into something rich and strange. 
Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell- 
Hark ! now I hear them, ding dong bell. 

[Burden ding-dong. 

Ferdinand. The ditty does remember my drown'd father. 
This is no mortal business, nor no sound 
That the earth owns : I hear it now above me." — 

The courtship between Ferdinand and Miranda 
is one of the chief beauties of this play. It is the 
very purity of love. The pretended interference of 
Prospero with it heightens its interest, and is in 
character with the magician, whose sense of preter- 
natural power makes him arbitrary, tetchy, and im- 
patient of opposition. 

The Tempest is a finer play than the Midsummer 
NighVs Bream, which has sometimes been compared 
with it; but it is not so fine a poem, %'here are a 
greater number of beautiful passages in the latter. 
Two of the most striking in the Tempest are 
spoken by Prospero. The one is that admirable 
one when the vision which he has conjured up 
disappears, beginning " The cloud-capp'd towers, 
the gorgeous palaces," &c. which has been so often 
quoted, that every schoolboy knows it by heart ; 
the other is that which Prospero makes in abjuring 
his art. 

" Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves, 
And ye that on the sands with printless foot 
Do chase the ebbing i^eptune, and do fly him 
When he coraes !.ack ; you derai-puppets, that 
By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make, 



132 



THE TEMPEST. 



Whereof the ewe not bites ; and you whose pastime 
Is to make midnight mushrooms, that rejoice 
To hear the solemn curfew, by whose aid 
(Weak masters tho' ye be) I have bediram'd 
The noontide sua, call'd forth the mutinous winds, 
And 'twixt the green sea and the azur'd vault 
Set roaring war; to the dread rattling thunder 
Have I giv'n fire, and rifted Jove's stout oak 
With his own bolt; the strong bas'd promontory 
Have I made shake, and by the spurs pluck'd up 
The pine and cedar : graves at my command 
Have wak'd their sleepers ; op'd, and let 'em forth 
By my so potent art. But this rough magick 
I here abjure ; and when I have requir'd 
Some heav'nly musick, which ev'n now I do, 
(To work mine end upon their senses that 
This airy charm is for) I'll break my staff. 
Bury it certain fadoras in the earth, 
And deeper than did ever plummet sound* 
I'll drown my book." — 

We musy|K)t forget to mention, among other things 
in this play, that Shakspeare has anticipated nearly 
all the arguments on the Utopian schemes of mo- 
dern philosophy. 

" Gonsalo. Had I the plantation of this isle, my lord — 

Antonio. He'd sow't with nettle-seed. 

^Sebastian. Or docks or mallows. 

Gonsalo. And were the king on't, what would I do.^ 

Sebastian. 'Scape being drunk, for want of wine, 

Gonzalo. I' th' commonwealth I would by contraries 

Execute all things : for no kind of traffick 

Would I admit ; no name of magistrate ; 

Letters should not be known ; wealth, poverty, 

And use of service, none ; contract, succession, 

Bourn, bound of land, tilth, vineyard, none; 

No use of metal, corn, or wine, or oil ; 

No occupation, all men idle, all, 



THE TEMPEST. 133 

And women too ; but innocent and pure : 
No sov'reignty. 

Sebastian, And yet he wonld be king on't. 

Antonio. The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the 
beginning. 

Gonsalo. All things in common nature should produce 
Without sweat or endeavour. Treason, felony, 
Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need of any engine 
Would I not have ; but nature should bring forth, 
Of its own kind, all foizon, all abundance 
To feed my innocent people ! 

Sebastian. No marrying 'moog his subjects ? 

Jntonio. None, man j all idle j whores and knaves. 

Gonzalo, I would with such perfection govern, sir, 
T' excel the golden age. 

Sebastian. Save bis majesty !" 



12 



THE 



MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 



Bottom the Weaver is a character that has not had 
justice done him. He is the most romantick of me- 
chanicks. And what a list of companions he has— 
Quince the Carpenter, Snug the Joiner, Flute the 
Bellows-mender, Snout the Tinker, Starveling the 
Tailor ; and then again, what a group of fairy attend- 
ants, Puck, Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mus- 
tardseed ! It has been observed that Shakspeare's 
characters are constructed upon deep physiological 
principles ; and there is something in this play which 
looks very like it. Bottom the Weaver, who takes 
the lead of 

" This crew of patches, rude mechanicals, 
That work for bread upon Athenian stalls," 

follows a sedentary trade, and he is accordingly re- 
presented as conceited, serious, and fantastical. He is 
ready to undertake any thing and every thing, as if 
it was as much a matter of course as the motion of 
his loom and shuttle. He is for playing the tyrant, 
the lover, the lady, the lion. *' He will roar that it 



MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 135 

shall do any man's heart good to hear him ;" and this 
being objected to as improper, he still has a resource 
in his good opinion of himself, and '' will roar you an 
'twere any nightingale." Snug the Joiner is the 
moral man of the piece, who proceeds by measure- 
ment and discretion in all things. You see him with 
his rule and compasses in his. hand. " Have you the 
lion's part written ? Pray you, if it be, give it me, for 
I am slow of study." — '•' You may do it extempore," 
says Quince, "for it is nothing but roaring." Starve- 
ling the Tailor keeps the peace, and objects to the 
lion and the drawn sword. " I believe we must leave 
the killing out when all's done." Starveling, how- 
ever, does not start the objections himself, but se- 
conds ihem when made bj^ others, as if he had not 
spirit to express his fears without encouragement. It 
is too much to suppose all this intentional : but it 
very luckily falls out so. Nature includes all that is 
implied in the most subtle analytical distinctions; 
and the same distinctions will be found in Shakspeare. 
Bottom, who is not only chief actor, but stage-mana- 
ger for the occasion, has a device to obviate the dan- 
ger of frightening the ladies : " Write me a prologue, 
and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm 
with our swords, and that Py ramus is not killed in- 
deed ; and for better assurance, tell them that I, 
Pj^ramus, am not Pyramus, but Bottom the Weaver: 
this will put them out of fear." Bottom seems to 
have understood the subject of dramatick illusion at 
least as well as any modern essayist. If our holiday 
mechanick rules the roast among his fellows, he is no 
less at home in his new character of an ass, " with 
amiable cheeks and fair large ears." He instinctive- 



136 MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 

I7 acquires a most learned taste, and groTss fastidious 
in the choice of dried peas and bottled hay. He is 
quite familiar with his new attendants, and assigns 
them their parts with all due gravity. " Monsieur 
Cobweb, good Monsieur, get your weapon in your 
hand, and kill me a red-hipt bumblebee on the 
top of a thistle, and, good Monsieur, bring me the 
honey-bag." What an exact knowledge is here 
shewn of natural history ! 

Puck, or Robin Gooclfellow, is the leader of the 
fairy band. He is the Ariel of the Midsum.mer 
Night's Dream; and yet as unlike as can be to the 
Ariel in The Tempest. - No other poet could have 
mada two such different characters out of the same 
fanciful materials and situations. Ari'el is a minister 
of retribution, who is touched with a sense of pily 
at the woes he inflicts. Puck is a mad-cap sprite, 
full of wantonness and mischief, who laughs at those 
whom he misleads — " Lord, what fools these mortals 
be !" Ariel cleaves the air, and executes his mis- 
sion with the zeal of a winged messenger ; Puck 
is borne along on his fairy errand like the light and 
glittering gossamer before the breeze. He is, indeed, 
a most E()icurean little gentleman, dealing in quaint 
devices, and faring in dainty delights. Prospero 
and his world of spirits are a set of moralists : but 
with Oberon and his fairies we are launched at 
once into the empire of the buttertlies. How beauti- 
fully is this race of beings contrasted with the 
men and women actors in the scene, by a single 
epithet which Titania gives to the latter, " the 
human mortals !" It is astonishing that Shakspeare 
should be considered, not only by foreigners, but 



MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. I3f 

by many of our own criticks, as a gloomy and 
heavy writer, who painted nothing but " gorgons 
and hydras, and chimeras dire." His subtlety 
exceeds that of all other dramatick writers, insomuch 
that a celebrated person of the present day said, 
that he regarded him rather as a metaphysician than 
a poet. His delicacy and sportive gayety are infi- 
nite. In the Midsummer Night's Dream alone, 
we should imagine, there is more sweetness and 
beauty of description than in the whole range of 
French poetry put together. What we mean is 
this, thst we will produce out of that single play 
ten passages, to which we do not think any ten 
passages in the works of the French poets can 
be opposed, displaying equal fancy and imagery. 
Shall we mention the remonstrance of Helena to 
Hermia, or Titania's description of her fairy train, or 
her disputes with Oberon about the Indian boy, 
or Puck's account of himself and his employments, 
or the Fairy Queen's exhortation to the elves to 
pay due attendance upon her favourite. Bottom; 
or Hippolita's description of a chase, or Theseus's 
answer ? The two last are as heroical and spirited 
as the others are full of luscious tenderness. The 
reading of this play is like wandering in a grove by 
moonlight : the descriptions breathe a sweetness like 
odours thrown from beds of flowers. 

Titania's exhortation to the fairies to wait upon 
Bottom, which is remarkable for a certain cloying 
sweetness in the repetition of the rhymes, is as 
follows : — - 

*' Be kind and courteous to this geiytleman. 
Hop m his walks, and gambol in his eyes, 
12* 



138 MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 

Feed him with apricock? and dewberries, 
With purple grapes, green Rgs and mulberries ; 
The hnney-bngs steel from the humble bees, 
And for night lapers crop their waxen thighs, 
And light them at the fiery g^ow worm*s eyes, 
To have my love to bed, and to arise : 
And pluck the wings from painted butterflies. 
To fan the moonbeanis from his sleeping eyes ; 
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.*' 

The sounds of the hite and of the trumpet are not 
more iHstincf than the poetry of the foregoing pas- 
sage, and of the conversation between Theseus and 
Hippolita. 

" Theneus. Go, one of you, find out the forester. 
For now our observation is perfcrm'd ; 
And since we have the vaward of the day, 
My love shall hear the musick of my hounds. 
Uncouple in the western valley, go, 
Despatch, T say, and find the forester. 
"We will, fair Uueen, up to the mountain's top, 
And mark the musical confusion 
Of V.ounds and echo in conjunction. 

Hippolita. I was with Hercules and Cadmus once^ 
When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the boar 
With hounds of Sparta ; never did I hear 
Such gallant chiding. For besides the groves, 
The skies, the fountains, every region near 
SeemM all one mutual cry. I never heard 
So rausicaT a di.-:cord, such sweet thunder. 

Theseus. My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind» 
So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung 
With ears that sweep away the morning dew ; 
Crook-knee'd and dewlap'd, like Thessalian bulls. 
Slow in pursuit, but matched in iaouth like bells, 
Each under each. A cry more tuneable 
Was never ballooM to, nor cheer'd with horn^ 
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly t 
Judge wh?D you hear," — 



MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 139 

Even Titiun never made a hunting piece of a p;nsto 
so fresh and lusty, and so near the first ages of the 
world HS this. — 

It has been sugsj^sted to us, that the Midsummer 
Night's Dream would do admirably to get up as a 
Christmas afterpiece ; and our promjtter proposed 
that Mr. Keau should play the part of Bottom, as 
worthy of his great talents. He might, in the dis- 
charge of his duly, offer to phiy the lady like any 
of our actresses that he pleased, the lover or the 
tyrant like any of our actors that he pleased, and 
the lion like "the most fearful wildfowl living." 
The carpenter, the tailor, and Joiner, it was thought, 
would hit the galleries. The young ladies in love 
would interest the side boxes ; and Robin Goodfel- 
low and his companions excite a lively fellow-feel- 
ing in the children from school. There would be two 
courts, an empire within an empire, the Athenian 
and the Fairy King and Queen, with their attend- 
ants, and with all their finery. What an opportuni- 
ty for processions, for the sonnd of trumpets and 
glittering of spears ! Y/hat a fluttering of urchins' 
painted wings; what a delightful profusion of gauze 
clouds and airy spirits floating on them ! 

Alas, the experiment has been tried, and has fail- 
ed ; not through the fault of Mr. Kean, who did not 
play the part of Bottom, nor of Mr. Liston, who did, 
and who played it well, but from the nature of things. 
The Midsummer Ntght's Dream, when acted, is 
converted from a delightful fiction into a dull panto- 
mime. All that is finest in the play is lost in the 
representation. The spectacle was grand ; but the 
spirit was evaporated, the genius was fled.—Poetry 



\ 



140 MIDSUMMER NICRT'S DREAM. 

and the stage do not agree well together. The at- 
tempt to reconcile them in this instance fails not 
only of effect, but of decorum. The ickal can 
ha\-e no place upon the st?ge, which is a picture 
without perspective: every thing there is in the 
foreground. That which was merely an airy shape, 
a dream, a passing thought, immediately becomes 
an unmanageable reality. Where all is left to the 
imagination (as is the case in reading) every circum- 
stance, near or remote, has an equal chance of being 
kept in mind, and tells according to the mised im- 
pression of all that has been suggested. But the 
imagination cannot sufficiently qu'iliry the actual 
impressions of the senses. Any offence given to 
the eye is not to be got rid of by ex[)lanation. 
Thus Bottom's head in the play is a fantastick illu- 
sion, produced by Magick spells: on the stage, it 
is an ass's head, and nothing more ; certainlj' a very 
strange costume for a gentleman to appear in. Fan- 
cy cannot be embodied any more than a simile can 
be painted ; and it is as idle to attempt it as to per- 
sonate Wall or Moonshine. Fairies are not incredi- 
ble, but fairies six feet high are so. Monsters are 
not shocking, if they are seen at a proper distance. 
When ghosts ajjpear at mid day, when apparitions 
stalk along Cheapside, then may the Midsummer 
Night's Dream be represented without injury at 
Covent-garden or at Drury-lane. The boards of a 
theatre and the regions of fancy are not the same 
thing. 



ROMEO AND JULIET. 



Romeo ♦and Juliet is the only tragedy which 
Shakspeare has written entirely on a love-story. It 
is supposed to have been his first play, and it de- 
serves to stand in that proud rank. There is the 
buoyant spirit of youth in every line, in the raptu- 
rous intoxication of hope, and in the bitterness of 
despair. It has been said of Romeo and Juliet 
by a great critick, that " whatever is most intoxicat- 
ing in the odour of a southern spring, languishing 
in the song of the nightingale, or voluptuous in the 
first opening of the rose, is to be found in this poem." 
The description is true ; and yet it does not answer 
to our idea of the play. For it has the sweetness 
of the rose, it has its freshness too; if it has the 
languor of the nightingale's song, it has also its 
giddy transport; if it has the softness of a southern 
spring, it is as glowing and as bright. There is 
nothing of a sickly and sentimental cast. Romeo 
and Juliet are in love, but they are not lovesick. 
Every thing speaks the very soul of pleasure, the 
high and healthy pulse of the passions: the heart 
beats, the blood circulates and mantles throughout. 



142 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

Their courtship is not an insipid interchange of 
sentiments lip deep, learnt at second hand from 
poems and plays, — made up of beauties of the 
most shadowy kind, of "fancies wi>n that hang the 
pensive head," of evanescent smiles and sighs that 
breathe not, of delicacy that shrinks from the touch, 
and feebleness that scarce supports itself, an elaborate 
vacuity of thought, and an artificial dearth of sfuse, 
spirit, truth, and nnture! It is the reverse of all this. 
It is Shakspeare ail over, and Shakspeare when he 
was young. 

We have heard it objected to Romeo and Juliet, 
that it is founded on an idle passion between a boy 
and a girl, who have scarcely seen and can have 
but little sympathy or rational esteem for one an- 
other, who have had no experience of the good or ills 
of life, or whose raptures or desj)air must be there- 
fore equally groundless and fantastical. Whoever 
objects to the youth of the parties in this play as 
** too unripe and crude" to pluck the sweets of love, 
and wishes to see a first love carried on into a good 
old age, and the passions taken at the rebound, when 
their force is spent, may find all this done in the 
Stranger and in other German plays, where they do 
things by contraries, and transpose nature to inspire 
sentiment and create philosophy. Shakspeare pro- 
ceeded in a more strait-forward, and, we think, efifec- 
tual way. He did not endeavour to extract beauty 
from wrinkles, or the wild throb of passion from the 
last expiring sigh of indifference. He did not " gath- 
er grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles." It was not 
his way. But he has given a picture of human 
life, such as it is in the order of nature. He has 



ROMEO AND JULIET. 143 

founded the passion of the two lovers not on the 
pleasures they had experienced, but on all the pleasures 
they had not experienced. All that was to come of 
life w^as theirs, ^t that untried source of promised 
happiness they slaked their thirst, and the first eager 
draught made them drunk with love and joy. They 
•were in full possession of their senses and their affec- 
tions. Their hopes were of air, their desires of fire. 
Youth is the season of love, because the heart is then 
first melted in tenderness from the touch of novelty, 
and kindled to rapture, for it knows no end of its 
enjoyments or its wishes. Desire has no limit but 
itself. Passion, the love and expectation of pleasure, 
is infinite, extravagant, inexhaustible, till experience 
comes to check and kill it. Juliet exclaims on her 
first interview with Romeo — 

" My bounty is as boundless as the sea, 
My love as deep." 

And why should it not ? What was to hinder the 
thrilling tide of pleasure, which had just gushed from 
her heart, from flowing on without stint or measure, 
but experience which she was yet without ? What 
was to abate the transport of the first sweet sense of 
pleasure, which her heart and her senses had just 
tasted, but indiflference which she was yet a stranger 
to ? What was there to check the ardour of hope, of 
faith, of constancy, just rising in her breast, but dis- 
appointment which she had not yet felt ? As ore the 
desires and the hopes of youthful passion, such is the 
keenness of its disappointments, and their baleful 
effect. Such is the transition ia this play from the 
highest bliss to the lowest despair^ from the nup- 



144 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

tial couch to an untimelj grave. The only evil that 
even in apprehension befalls the two lovers is the 
loss of the greatest possible felicity ; yet this loss is 
fatal to both, for they had rather part with life than 
bear the thought of surviving all that had made life dear 
to them. In all this, Shakspeare has but followed 
nature, which existed in his time, as well as now. 
The modern philosophy, which reduces the whole 
theory of the mind to habitual impressions, and 
leaves the natural impulses of passion and imagination 
out of the account, had not then been discovered ; or 
if it had, would have been little calculated for the 
uses of poetry. 

It is the inadequacy of the same false system of 
philosophy to account for the strength of our earli- 
est attachments, which has led Mr. Wordsworth 
to indulge in the mystical visions of Platonism in 
his Ode on the Progress of Life. He has very 
admirably described the vividness of our impres- 
sions in youth and childhood, and how " they fade 
by degrees into the light of common day," and 
he ascribes the change to the supposition of a pre- 
existent state, as if our early thoughts were nearer 
heaven, reflections of former trails of glory> sha- 
dows of our past being. This is idle. It is not 
from the knowledge of the past that the first im- 
pressions of things derive their gloss and splendour, 
but from our ignorance of the future, which fills the 
void to come with the warmth of our desires, with 
our gayest hopes, and brightest fancies. It is the 
obscurity spread before it that colours the pros- 
pect of life with hope, as it is the cloud which 
reflects the rainbow. There is no occasion to resort 



ROMEO AND JULIET. 145 

to any mystical union and transmission of feeling 
through different states of being to account for the 
romantick enthusiasm of youth ; nor to plant the 
root of hope in the grave, nor to derive it from 
the skies. Its root is in the heart of man : it lifts 
its head above the stars. Desire and imagination 
are inmates of the human breast. The heaven 
" that lies about us in our infancy" is only a new 
world, of which we know nothing but what we 
wish it to be, and believe all that we wish. In 
youth and boyhood, the world we live in is the 
world of desire, and of fancy : it is experience that 
brings us down to the world of reality. What is 
it that in youth sheds a dewy light round the 
evening star ? That makes the daisy look so 
bright ? That perfumes the hyacinth ? That em- 
balms the first kiss of love ? It is the delight of 
novelty, and the seeing no end to the pleasure 
that we fondly believe is still in store for us. The 
heart revels in the luxury of its own thoughts, and 
is unable to sustain the weight of hope and love 
that presses upon it. — The effects of the passion of 
love alone might have dissipated Mr. Wordsworth's 
theory, if he means any thing more by it than an 
ingenious and poetical allegory. That at least is not 
a link in the chain let down from other worlds; " the 
purjjle light of love" is not a dim reflection of the 
smiles of celestial bliss. It does not appear till 
the middle of life, and then seems like "another 
morn risen on mid-day." In this respect the soul 
comes into the world " in utter nakedness." Love 
waits for the ripening of the youthful blood. The 
sense of pleasure precedes the love of pleasure, but 
13 



146 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

with the sense of pleasure, as soon as it is felt, come 
thronging infinite desires and hopes of pleasure, and 
love is mature as soon as born. It withers and it 
dies almost as soon ! 

This play presents a beautiful coup-d'ceil of the 
progress of human life. In thought it occupies years, 
and embraces the circle of the affections from child- 
hood to old age. Juliet has become a great girl, a 
young woman, since we tirst remember her a little 
thing in the idle prattle of the nurse ; Lady Capulet 
was about her age when she became a mother, and 
old Capulet somewhat impatiently tells his younger 
visitors, 

*' I've seen the day, 

That I have worn a visor, and could tell 

A whispering tale in a fair lady's ear, 

Such as would please : 'tis gone, 'tis gone, 'tis gone." 

Thus one period of life makes way for the follow- 
ing, and one generation pushes another off the stage. 
One of the most striking passages to shew the in- 
tense feeling of youth in this play, is Capulet's invi- 
tation to Paris to visit his entertainment. 

" At niy poor house, look to behold this night 
Earth treading stars that make dark heav'n light; 
Such comfort as do lusty yoLing men feel 
"When well-apparel'd April on the heel 
Of limping winter treads, even such delight 
Among fresh female buds shall you this night 
Inherit at my house." 

The feelings of youth and of the spring are here 
blended together like the breath of opening flowers. 
Images of vernal beauty appear to have floated be- 
fore the author's mind, in writing this poem, in pro- 



ROMEO AND JULIET. H7 

fusion. Here is another of exquisite beauty, brougtit 
in more by accident than by necessity. Montague 
declares of his son smit with a hopeless passion 
which he will not reveal — 

" But he, his own affection's counsellor, 
Is to himself so secret and so close, 
So far from sounding and discovery, 
As is the bud bit with an envious worm. 
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air. 
Or dedicate his beauty to the sun." 

This casual description is as full of passionate 
beauty as when Romeo dwells in fiantick fondness 
on " the white wonder of his Juliet's hand." The 
reader may, if he pleases, contrast the exquisite 
pastoral simplicity of the above lines with the gor- 
geous description of Juliet when Romeo tirst sees her 
at her father's house, surrounded by company and 
artificial splendour. 

" What lady's that which doth enrich the hand 
Of yonder knight p 

O she doth teach the torches to burn bright ; 
Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night, 
Like a rich jewel in an ^Ethiop*s ear." 

It would be hard to say which of the two gar- 
den scenes is the finest, that where he first conver- 
ses with his love, or takes leave of her the morning 
after their marriage. Both are like a heaven upon 
earth : the blissful bowers of Paradise let down upon 
this lower world. We will give only one passage of 
these well known scenes to shew the perfect refine- 
ment and delicacy of Shakspeare's conception of the 
female character. It is wonderful how Collins, who 
was a critick and a poet of great sensibility, should 



148 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

have encouraged the coramoa errour on this subject 
by saying — " But stronger Shakspeare felt for man 
alone." 

The passage we mean is Juliet's apology for her 
maiden boldness. 

*' Thou tnow'st the mask of night is on my face j 
Else would a maiden bhish bepaint my cheek 
For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night. 
Fain would I dwell on form, fain, fain deny 
What I have spoke — but farewell compliment : 
Dost thou love me ? I know thou wilt say, ay, 
And I will take thee at thy word — Yet if thou swear'st, 
Thou may'st prove false j at lovers' perjuries 
They say Jove laughs. Oh gentle Romeo, 
If thou dost love, prouotmce it faithfully j 
Or if thou thick I am too quickly won, 
I'll frown and be perverse, and say thee nay, 
So thou wilt woo : but else not for the world. 
In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond ; 
And therefore thou may'st think my 'haviour light ; 
But trust me, gentleman, I'll prove more true 
Than thoste that have more cunning to be strange. 
I should have been more strange, I must confess, 
But that thou overheard'st, ere I was ware. 
My true love's passion; therefore pardon me, 
And not impute this yielding to light love. 
Which the dark night hath so discovered." 

In this and all the rest her heart fluttering be- 
tween pleasure, hope, and fear, seems to have dictat- 
ed to her tongue, and " calls true love spoken, sim- 
ple modesty." Of the same sort, but bolder in vir- 
gin innocence, is her soliloquy after her marriage 
with Romeo. 

" Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds, 
Towards Phoebus' mansion; such a waggoner 
As Phaeton would whip you to the west, 



ROMEO AND JULIET. H9 

And bring in cloudy night immediately, 
Spread thy close curtain, love-perforining night ; 
That runaways' eyes may wink ; and Romeo 

Leap to these arms, untalked of, and unseen ! 

Lovers can see to do their amorous rites 

By their own beauties: or if love be blind, 

It best agrees with night.— Come, civil night, 

Thou sober-suited matron, all in black. 

And learn me how to lose a winning match, 

Play'd for a pair of stainless maidenhoods : 

Hood my unmann'd blood bating in ray cheeks, 

With thy black mantle; till strange love, grown bold, 

Thinks true love acted, simple modesty. 

Come, night ! — Come, Romeo ! come, thou day in night j 

For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night 

Whiter than new snow on a raven's back. 

Come, gentle night; come, loving, black-brow'd night, 
Give me my Romeo : and when he shall die, 
Take him and cut him out in little stars. 
And he will make the face of heaven so fine. 
That all the world shall be in love with night. 

And pay no worship to the garish sun. 

O, 1 have bought the mansion of a love, 
But not possess'd it ; and though I am sold, 
Not yet enjoy'd : so tedious is this day, 
As is the night before some festival 
To an inip^itienl child, that hath new robes. 
And may not wear them." 

We the ralher insert this passage here, in as much 
as we have no doubt it has been expunged from the 
Family Shakspeare. Such criticks do not perceive 
that the feelings of the heart sanctify, without dis- 
guising, the impulses of nature. Without refinement 
themselves, they confound modesty with hypocrisy. 
Not so the German critick, Schlegel. Speaking of 
Romeo and Juliet, he says, " It was reserved for 
Shakspeare to unite purity of heart and the glow of 
imagination, sweetness, and dignity of manners, and 
13 * 



350 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

passionate violence, in one ideal picture." The cha- 
racter is indeed one of perfect truth and sweetness. 
It has nothing forward, nothing coy, nothing affected 
or coquettish about it; — it is a pure effusion of nature. 
It is as frank as it is modest, for it has no thought 
that it wishes to conceal. It reposes in conscious 
innocence on the strength of its affections. Its de- 
licacy does not consist in coldness and reserve, but 
in combining warn^th of imagination and tenderness 
of heart with the niost voluptuous sensibility. Love 
is a gentle flame that rarefies and expands her w hole 
being. A^'hat an idea of trembling haste and airy 
grace, borne upon the thoughts of love, does the 
Friar's exclamation give of her, as she approaches 
his cell to be married — 

" Here comes the lady. Oh, so light of foot 
"Will ne'er wear out the everlasting flint : 
A lover may bestride the gossamer, 
'i'hat idles in the wanton summer air, 
And yet not fall, so light is vanity." 

The tragick part of this character is of a piece 
with the rest. It is the heroick founded on tender- 
ness and delicacy. Of this kind are her resolution 
to follow the Friar's advice, and the conflict in her 
bosom between apprehension and love when she 
comes to take the sleeping poison. Shakspeare is 
blamed for the mixture of low characters. If this is 
a deformity, it is the source of a thousand beauties. 
One instance is the contrast between the guileless 
sim))licity of Juliet's attachment to her first love, and 
the convenient policy of the nurse in advising her 
to marry Paris, which excites such indignation in 
her mistress. " Ancient damnation ! oh most wick- 
ed fiend," &c. 



ROMEO ANB JULIET. 151 

Romeo is Hamlet in iove. There is the same rich 
exuberance of passion and sentiment in the one, that 
there is of thought and sentiment in the other. Both 
are absent and self-involved, both live out of them- 
selves in a world of imagination. Hamlet is abstract- 
ed from every thing; Romeo is abstracted from 
e\ery thing but his love, and lost in it. His " frail 
thoughts dally with faint surmise," and are fash- 
ioned out of the suggestions of hope, " the flatte- 
ries of sleep.'* He is himself only in his Juliet ; 
she is his only reality, his heart's true home and 
idol. The rest of the world is to him a passing 
dream. How finely is this character pourtrayed 
where he recollects himself on seeing Paris slain at 
the tomb of Juliet ! 

" What said my man when ray betossed soul 
Did not attend him as we rode ? I think 
He told me Paris should have married Juliet." 

And again, just before he hears the sudden tidings of 
her death — 

*' If I may trust the flattery of sleep, 
My dreams presage some joyful news at hand j 
My bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne, 
And all this day an unaccustora'd spirit 
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts. 
I dreamt my lady came ahd found me dead, 
(^Strange dream ! that gives a dead man leave to think) 
And breath 'd such life with kisses on my lips, 
That I reviv'd and was an emperour, 
Ah me ! how sweet is love itself possess'd, 
W^hen but love's shadows are so rich in joy I" 

Romeo's passion for Juliet is not a first love : it 
succeeds and drives out his passion for another mis- 



152 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

tress, Rosaline, as the sun hides the stars. This is 
perhaps an artifice (not absolutely necessary) to give 
us a higher opinion of the lady, while the first ab- 
solute surrender of her heart to him enhances the 
richness of the prize. The commencement, pro- 
gress, and ending of his second passion are however 
complete in themselves, not injured, if they are not 
bettered by the first. The outline of the play is 
taken from an Italian novel ; but the dramatick ar- 
rangement of the different scenes between the lov- 
ers, the more than dramatick interest in the progress 
of the story, the development of the characters 
with time and circumstances, just according to the 
degree and kind of interest escited, are not inferi- 
our to the expression of passion and nature. It has 
been ingeniously remarked among other proofs of 
skill in the contrivance of the fable, that the im- 
probability of the main incident in the [jiece, the ad- 
ministering of the sleeping potion, is softened and 
obviated from (he beginning by the introduction of 
the Friar on his first appearance culling simples and 
descanting on their virtues. Of the passionate 
scenes in this tragedy, that belAveen the Friar and 
Romeo when he is told of his sentence of banish- 
ment, that between Juliet and the Nurse when she 
hears of it, and of the death of her cousin Tybalt, 
(which bear no proportion in her mind, when pas- 
sion, after the first shock of surprise, thro^NS its weight 
into the scale of her affections) and the last scene 
at tiie tomb, are among the most natural and over- 
powering. In all of these it is not merely the force 
of any one passion that is given, but the slightest 
and most unlooked for transitions from one to an- 



ROMEO AND JULIET. 153 

other, the mingling currents of every different feel- 
ing rising up and prevailing in turn, swayed by the 
master-mind of the poet, as the waves undulate be- 
neath the gliding storm. Thus, when Juliet has by 
her complaints encouraged the Nurse to say, " Shame 
come to Romeo," she instantly repels the wish, 
which she had herself occasioned, by answering—- 

" Blister'd be thy tongue 
For such a wish, he was uot born to shame. 
Upon his brow shame is ashamed to sit, 
For 'tis a throne where honour may be crowu'd 
Sole monarch of the universal earth ! 
O, what a beast was I to chide him so ! 

Nurse. W^ill you speak well of him that kill'd your cousId ? 

Juliet. Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband ? 
Ah my poor lord, what tongue shall smooth thy name. 
When 1, thy three-hours' wife, have mangled it ?" 

And then follows on the neck of her remorse and 
returning fondness, that wish treading almost on 
the brink of imj»iety, but still held back by the 
strength of her devotion to her lord, that " father, 
mother, nay, or both were dead," rather than Romeo 
banished. If she requires any other excuse, it is in 
the manner in which Romeo echoes her frantick 
grief and disappointment in the next scene at be- 
ing banished from her, — Perhaps one of the finest 
pieces of acting that ever was witnessed on the 
stage, is Mr. Kean's manner of doing this scene, and 
his repetition of the word. Banished. He treads 
close, indeed, upon the genius of his author. 

A passage which this celebrated actor and able 
commentator on Shakspeare (actors are the best 
commentators on the poets) did not give with equal 
truth or force of feeling, was the one which Romeo 



154 ROMEO AND JULIET. 

makes at the tomb of Juliet, before he drinks the 
poison. 



Let me peruse this face- 



Mercutio's kin?man ! noble county Paris! 
What said my man, when my betossed soul 
Did not attend him as we rode ! I think, 
He told me, Paris should have marry'd Juliet ! 
Said he not so P or did I dream it so ? 
Or am I mad. hearing him talk of Juliet, 

To think it was so ? O, give me thy hand, 

One writ with me in sour misfortuue's book ! 

I'll bury thee in a triumphant grave 

For here lies Juliet, 
******** 

O, my love ! my wife ! 

Death, that hath suck'd the honey of thy brtalb, 
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty : 
Thou art not conquer'd ; beauty's ensign yet 
Is crimson in thy lips, and in thy cheeks. 

And Death's pale flag is not advanced there. 

Tybalt, ly'st thou there in thy bloody sheet? 

O, what more favour can I do to thee, 

Than with that hand that cut thy youth in twain, 

To sunder his that was thine enemy ? 

Forgive me, cousin! Ah, dear Juliet, 

Why art thou yet so fair ! J will believe 

That unsubstantial death is amorous ; 

And that the lean abhorred monster keeps 

Thee here in dark to be his paramour. 

For fear of that, I will stay still with thee; 

And never from this palace of dim night 

Depart again : here, here will I remain 

With worms that are thy chambermaids ; O, here 

Will I set up my everlasting rest ; 

And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars 

From this world wearied flesh. — Eyes, look your last ! 

Arms, take your last embrace ! and lips, O you 

The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss 

A dateless bargain to engrossing death ! 

Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide ! 



ROMEO AND JULIET. 155 

Thou desperate pilot, nove at once run on 
The dashing rocks my sea-sick weary bark ! 
Here's to my love ! — [Drinks.] O, true apothecary ! 
Thy drugs are quick.— Thus with a kiss I die. 

The lines in this speech describing the loveliness 
of Juliet, who is supposed to be dead, have been 
compared to those in which it is said of Cleopatra 
after her death, that she looked " as she would take 
another Antony in her strong toil of grace;" and a 
question has been started which is the finest, that we 
do not pretend to decide. We can more easily de- 
cide between Shakspeare and any other author, than 
between him and himself. — Shall we quote any 
more passages to shew his genius or the beauty of 
Romeo and Juliet ? At that rate, we might 
quote the whole. The late Mr. Sheridan, on being 
shown a volume of the Beauties of Shakspeare, very 
properly asked — " But where are the other eleven ?" 
The character of Mercutio in this play is one of 
the most mercurial and spirited of the productions of 
Shakspeare's comick muse. 



LEAE, 



W^E wish that we could pass this play over, and 
say nothing about it. All that we can say must fall 
far short of the subject; or even of what we ourselves 
conceive of it. To attempt to give a description of 
the play itself, or of its effect upon the mind, is mere 
impertinence: yet we must say something. — It is 
then the best of all Shakspeare's plays, for it is the 
one in which he was the most in earnest. He was 
here fairly caught in the web of his own imagination. 
Th^ passion which he has taken as his subject, is that 
which strikes its root deepest into the human heart ; 
of which the bond is the hardest to be unloosed ; and 
the cancelling and tearing to pieces of which gives 
the greatest revulsion to the frame. This depth of 
nature, this force of passion, this tug and war of the 
elements of our being, this firm faith in filial piety, 
and the giddy anarchy and whirling tumult of the 
thoughts at finding this prop failing it, the contrast 
between the fixed, immovable basis of natural affec- 
tion, and the rapid, irregular starts of imagination, 
suddenly wrenched from all its accustomed holds 
and resting places in the soul, this is what Shak- 



LEAR. 157 

speare has given, ane? what nobody else but he conld 
give. So v/e believe. — The mind of Lear staggering 
between the weight of attachrneni and the hurried 
movements of passion, is like a tall ship driven about 
by the winds, buffetted by the furious waves, but that 
still rides above the storm, having its anchor liTied ir 
the bottom of the sea; or it is like the shirj» r 
circled by the eddying vvbir'jjool that foams au'' 
against it, or like the solid nromoatory j)usl 
its basis by the force of an earthquake. 

The chara<iter of Lear itself is very finely conceiv 
ed for the pur})ose. It is the only ground on which 
such a storj^ could be built with the greatest rrulh 
and effect. It is his rnsh haste, his violent imf>e- 
tuosity, his blindness to every thing l>ut the diet;Ueg 
of his {.assions or atlections. that producer a!! his 
misf(irtuiiies, that aggravates his im|>aiience of them, 
that enforces our pity for him. The part which 
Cordelia bears in the scene is extremtly beauti- 
ful : the story is almost told in the first wor(is she 
utters. We see at otice the precipice on which 
the poor* old king stands from his own extravagant 
and credulous importunity, the indiscreet simplicity 
of her love (which, to be sure, has a little of hep 
father's obstinacy in it) and the hollowness of her 
sisteis' pretensions. Almost the first burst of that 
noble tide of passion, which runs through the play, is w 
in the remonstrance of Kent to his roj'al master on 
the injustice of his sentence against his j'oungest 
daughter—" Be Kent unmannerly, when Lear is 
mad !" This m inly plainness, which draws down 
on him the dis;>leasure of the unadvised king, is 
worthy of the fidelity with which he adheres to 
^ 14 



i58 LEAR. 

his fallen fortunes. The true character of the two 
eldest daughters, Regau and Goneriil, (thry are 
so thoroughly hateful thai we do not even like to 
repeat their names) breaks out in their answer to 
Cordelia, who desires them to treat their father 
well — " Prescribe not us our duties" — their hatred 
of advice being in pro}3ortion to their determina- 
tion to do wrong, and to their hypocritical preten- 
sions to do right. Their deliberate hypocrisy adds 
the last finishing to the odiousness of their chnrac- 
ters. It is the absence of this detestable quality that 
is the only relief in the character of Edmund the 
Bastard, and that at times reconciles us to him. We 
are not tempted to exaggerate the guilt of his con- 
duct, when he himself gives it up as a bad business, 
and writes himself down " plain villain." Nothing 
more can be said about it. Kis religious ho- 
nesty in this respect is admirable. One speech 
of his is worth a million. His father, Gloster, 
w'lhom he has just deluded with a forged story of 
his brother Edgar's designs against his life, ac- 
counts for his unnatural behaviour and the strange 
depravity of the times from the late eclipses in the 
sun and moon. Edmund, who is in the secret, 
says when he is gone — " This is the excellent 
foppery of the world, that when we are sick in 
fortune (often the surfeits of our own behaviour) we 
make guilty of oyr disasters the sun, the moon, and 
stars : as if we were villains on necessity ; fools by 
heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treacher- 
ous by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and 
adulterers by an enforced obedience of planetary 
influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine 



LEAR. 15f 

thrusting on. An admirable evasion of whoremaster 
man, to lay his goatish disposil ion on the charge of 
a star! My father compounded with my mother 
under the Dragon's tail, and my nativity was under 
Ursa Major: so that it follows, I am rough and 
lecherous. 1 should liave been what I am, had the 
maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my 
bastardizing." — The whole character, its careless, 
light-hearted villany, contrasted with the sullen, 
rancorous malignity of Regan and Goneriii, its con- 
nexion with the conduct of the under-plot, in which 
Gloster's persecution of one of his sons and the in- 
gratitude of another, form a counterpart to the mis- 
takes and misfortunes of Lear, — his double amour 
with the two sisters, and the share which he has in 
bringing about the fatal catastrophe, are all managed 
with an uncommon degree of skill and power. 

it has been said, and we think justly, that the 
third act o( Othello and tiie three first acts of Lear, 
are Shakspeare's great masterpieces in the logick of 
passion : that they contain the highest examples 
not only of the force of individual passion, but of 
its dramatick vicissitudes and striking effects arising 
from the different circumstances and characters of 
the persons speaking. We see the ebb and flow of 
the feeling, its psuses an<i feverish starts, its impa- 
tience of opposition, its accumulating force when it 
has time to recollect itself, the manner in which it 
avails itself of every j)agsing word or gesture, its 
haste to repel insinuation, tiie alternate contraction 
and dilatation of the soul, and all '* the dazzling 
fence of controversy" in this mortal combat with 
poisoned weapons, aimed at the heart, where each 



t60 



LEAR. 



wound is fatal. We have seen in Othello, how the 
unsuspecting frankness and iini)etuoiJS passions of 
the Moor are playfd upon and exasperated by the 
artful dexterity of lago. In the present ()lay, that 
which aggravates the sense of symjfttthy in the read- 
er, and of uncontrolahle anguish in the swoln 
heart of Lear, is the petrifying iodiS*erence, the 
cold, calculating, obdurate selfishness of his daugh- 
ters. His keen passions seem whelled on their 
stony hearts. The contrast would be too painlul^ 
the shock too great, hut for the intervention of the 
Fool, whose well-timed levity comes in to break the 
continuity of feeling when it can no longer be 
borne, and to bring into play again the fibres of the 
heart just as they are growing rigid from over- 
strained excitement. The imagination is glad to 
take refuge in the half-comick, half-serious com- 
ments of the Fool, just as the mind, under the ex- 
treme anguish of a surgical o{)eration, vents itself in 
sallies of wit. The character was also a grotesque 
ornam«^nt of the barbarous times, in which alone the 
tragick groundwork of the story could be laid. In 
another point of view it is indispensable, in as much 
as while it is a diversion to the too great intensi- 
ty of our disgust, it carries the pathos to the highest 
pitch jf which it is capable, by shewing the pitiable 
weakness of the old kini;*s conduct, an«i its irretriev- 
able consequences in the most familiar point of view. 
Lear may well ^'.beat at the gate which let his folly 
in," after, as the Fool says, " he has made his 
daughters his mothers." The character is dropped 
in the third r>ct to make room fOr the entra»»ce of 
Edgar as Mad T^m, which well accords with the 



LEAR. 161 

increasing bustle and wildness of the incidents; and 
nothing can be more complete than the distinction 
between Lear's real and Edgar's assumed mndntss, 
while the resemblance in the cause of their distress- 
es, from the severing of the nearest ties of natural 
affection, keeps up a unity of interest. Shakspeare's 
mastery over his subject, if it was not art, was 
owing to a knowledge of the connecting links of the 
passions, and their effect upon the mind, still more 
wonderful than any systematick adherence to rules, 
and that anticipated and outdid all the efforts of the 
most refined art, not inspired and rendered instinc- 
tive by genius. 

One of the most perfect displays of dramatick 
power is the tirst interview between Lear and his 
daughter, after the designed affronts upon him, which 
till one of his knights reminds him of them, his 
sanguine temperament had led him to overlook. 
He returns with his train from hunting, and his usual 
impatience breaks out in his first words, *' Let me 
not stay a jot for dinner ; go, get it ready." He 
then encounters the faithful Kent in disguise, and 
retains him in his service ; and the first trial of iiis 
honest duty is to trip up the heels of the officious 
Steward who makes so prominent anil despicable a 
figure through the f>iece. On the entrance of Gone- 
rill the following dialogue takes place : — 

** Ltar. How now, flaughter p what makes that frontlet on ? 
Methinks, yoii are too much of late i' the frown. 
Fool. Thou wast a pretty fellow, when thou hadst no need to care 
for her frowning ; now thou art an O without a figure : I am het- 
ter than thou art now; lam a fool, thou art nothing. Yes, for- 
sooth, I will hold my tongue j [To Gonerill.] so your face bids me, 
though you say nothing. Mum, mum. 
14 * 



162 LEAR. 

He that kepps nor crust nor cruin, 
Weary of all, shall want some. — 



That's a sheal'd peascod ! [Pointing to Lear. 

Gonerill. Not only, sir, this your all-licens'd fool, 
But other of your insolent retinue 
Do hourly carp and quarrel ; breaking forth 
In rank and not to be endured riots, 
I had thought, by raaking^ this well known unto you, 
To have found a safe redress ; but now grow fearful, 
By what yourself too late have spoke and done, 
That you protect this course, and put it on 
By your allowance ; which if you stiould, the fault 
Would not 'scape censure, nor the redresses sleep. 
Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal. 
Might in their working do you that offence, 
(Which else were shame) that then necessity 
Would call discreet proceeding. 

Fool. For you trow, nunele, 

The hedge sparrow fed the cuckoo so long^ 
That it had its head bit off by its young. 
So out went the candle, and we were left darkling. 

Lear. Are you our daughter? 

Gonerill. Come, sir, 
I would, you would make use of that good wisdont 
Whereof I know you are fraught ; and put away 
These dispositions, which of late transform you 
From what you rightly are. 

Fool. May not an ass know when the cart draws the horse f— 
Whoop, Jug, I love thee. 

Lear. Does any here know me ? Why, this is not Lear • 

Does Lear walk thus ? speak thus ? — Where are his eyes ? 
Either his notion weakens, or his discernings 

Are lethargy'd Ha ! waking.'' — 'Tis not so 

Who is it that can tell me who I am ^-Lear's shadow ? 

I would learn that : for by the marks 

Of sov'reignty, of knowledge, and of reason, 

1 should be false persuaded 1 had daughters. > 

Your name, fair gentlewoman ? 

Gonerill Come, sir : 
This admiration is mucii o' the favoiir 



LEAR. 163 

Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you 
To understand njy purposes aright: 
^\s you are old and reverend, you should be wise: 
Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires j 
Men so disorder'd, so debauch'd, and bold, 
That this our court, infected with their manners, 
Shews like a riotous inn : epicurism and lust 
Make it more like a tavern, or a brothel, 
Than a grac'd palace. The shame itself doth speak 
'Tor instant remedy: be then desir'd 
By her, that else will take the thing she begs, 
A little to disquantity your train ; 
And the remainder, that shall still depend, 
To be such men as may besort your age. 
And know themselves and you. 

Lear. Darkness and devils ! 

Saddle my horses ; call my train togfther. 

Degenerate bastard ! I'll not trouble theej 
Yet have I left a daughter. 

Gonerill. You strike my people i and your disorder'd rabble. 
Make servants of their betters. 

Enter Albany. 
Lear. Woe, that too late repents— O, sir, are you come.^ 
Is it your will ? speak, sir.— Prepare my horses. 

[To Albany. 
Ingratitude ! thou marble-hearted fiend, 
More hideous, when thou shew'st thee in a child, 
Than the sea monster ! 

Albany. Pray, sir, be patient. 

hear. Detested kite ! thou liest. [To Gontrill. 

My train are men of choice and rarest parts, 
That all particulars of duty know ; 
And in the most exact regard support 

Th^ worships of their name. O most small fault, 

How ugly didst thou in Cordelia shew ! 

Which, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature 

From the fixt place ; drew from my heart all love. 

And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear ! 

Beat at the gate, that let thy folly in, [Striking his htad. 

And thy dear judgment out ! Go, go, my people ! 



164 LEAR. 

Albany. My lord, I am guiltless, as I am ignorant 
Of what hath mov'd you. 

Lear. It may he so, niy lord 

Hear, nature, hear ! dear goddes?, hear I 

Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst ioteud 

To make this creature fruitful ! 

Into her womb convey sterility j 

Dry up in her the organs of increase ; 

And from her derogate body never spring 

A babe to honour her ! If she must teem, 

Create her child of spleen : that it may live, 

To be a thwart disnatur'd torment to her ! 

Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth j 

With cadent tears fret channels in lier cheeks; 

Turn all her mother's pains, and benefits. 

To laughter and contempt ; that she may feel 

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is 

To have a thankless child ! Away, away ! [Exii. 

Albany. Now, gods, that we adore, whereof comes this ►' 

Gonerill. Never afflict yourself to know the cause ; 
But let his disposition have that scope 
That dotage gives it. 

Re-enter Lear. 

Lear. What, Sfty of my followers at a clap ! 
Within a fortnight ! 

Albany. What's the matter, sir p 

Lear. I'll tell thee ; life and death ! I am ashara'd 
That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus : 

[To Gonerill. 
That these hot tears, which break from me perforce, 

Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon thee ! 

The untented woundings of a father's curse 

Pierce every sense about thee ! Otd fond eyes 

Beweep this cause again, I'll pluck yoD out ; 
And cast you, with the waters that you loose, 

To temper clay. Ha ! is it come to this ? 

Let it be so : Yet have 1 left a daughter, 

Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable ; 
When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails 



LEAR. 165 

She'll flea thy wolfish visage. Thou shalt find, 
Tiiat I'Uiesiime the shape, which thou dost think 
I hyive cast off for ever, 

[Exeunt Lear, Kent^ and Attendants.''* 

This is certainly fine : no wonder that Lear says 
after it, " O let me not be mad, not mad, sweet hea- 
vens," feeling: its effects by antici;)ation : l)ut fine as 
is this burst of rage and indijjnation at the first blow 
ainned at his hopes and expectations, it is nothing 
near so fine as what follows from his double disap- 
pointment, and his lingering efforts to see which 
of them he shall lean upon for support and find com- 
fort in, when both his daughters turn against his age 
and weakness. It is with some ditficulty that Lear 
gets to speak with his daughter Regan, and her 
husband, at Gloster's castle. In concert with 
Gonerill they have left their own home on purpose 
to avoid him. His apprehensions are first alarmed 
by this circumstance, and when Gloster, whose 
guests they are, urges the fiery temper of the Duke 
of Cornwall as an excuse for not importuning him a 
second time, Lear breaks out, 

♦' Vengeance ! Phgue ! Death ! Conftision ! 
Fiery ? What fiery quality p Why, Gloster, 
VfX speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife." 

Afterwards, feeling perlians not well himself, he is 
inclined to admit their excuse from illrjess, hut then 
recollecting that they have set his mtssenger (Kent) 
in the stocks, all his susjticions are roused again, and 
he insists on seeing them. 

" Enter Cornwatx, Rkgan, Giosthr, and Servants. 
Lear. Good morrow to you both. 
Corntvall. Hail to your grace ! [Kent is set at liberty. 



166 LEAR. 

Regan. I ara glad to see your highness. 

Lear. Regan, 1 think you are ; i know what reason 
I have to think so ; if thou should'st not be glad, 
I would divorce me from my mother's tomb, 

Sepulch'ring an adultress. O, are you free ? 

[To Kent. 

Some other time for that. Beloved Regan, 

Thy sister's naught : O Regan, she hath tied 

^Sharp-tooth'd unkindness, like a vulture, here 

''^ [Points to his heart. 

I can scarce speak to thee; thou'lt not believe, 
Of how deprav'd a quality O Regan ! 

Regan. I pray you, sir, take patience j I have hope 
You less know how to value her desert, 
Than she to scant her duly. 

Lear. Say, how is that ? 

Regan. I cannot think my sister in the least 
Would fail her obligation ; if, sir, perchance, 
She have restrained the riots of your followers, 
'Tis on such ground, and to such wholesome end. 
As clears her from all blame. 

Lear. My curses on her ! 

Regan. O, sir, you are old; 
Nature in you stands on the very verge 
Of her confine : you should be rul'd, and led 
By some discretion, that discerns your state 
Better than you yourself : therefore, 1 pray you, 
That to our sister you do make return ; 
Say, you have wrong'd her, sir. 

Lear. Ask h«r forgiveness ? 
Do you but mark iiow this becomes the use ? 
Dear danghtet*, I confess that I nm old ; 
Age is unnecessary ; on my knees I beg, 
That you'll vouchsafe me raiment., bed, and food. 

Regan. Good sir, no more ; these are unsightly tricks ; 
Return you to my sister. 

Ltar. Never, Regan: 
She hath abated me of half my train ; 
Look'd blank upon me ; struck me with her tongue, 

Most serpent like, upon the very heart : 

All the stor'd vengeances of heaven fall 



LEAR. 167 

On lier ungrateful top ! Strike her young bones, 
You lakmg airs, wit!) lameness ! 

Cornwall. Fie, sir, fie ! 

Lear. You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames 
Into her scornful eyes ! Infect her beauty, 
You fen-auck'd fo^s, drawn by the powerful sun. 
To fall, aud blast lier priue ! 

Regan. O the blest gods ! 
So will you wish on me, when the rash mood is on. 

Lear. No, Regan, thou shall never have my curse j 
Thy tender-hefted nature shall uot give 
Thee o'er to harslnifrss ; her eyes are fierce, but thine 
Do comfort, and not burn : 'Tis not in thee 
To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train. 
To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes. 
And, in conclusion, to oppose the bolt 
Against my coiring in : thou bettei- know'ot 
The offices of nature, bond of childhood, 
Eff'r'Cts of courtesy, dues of gratitude ; 
Thy half o' the kingdom thou hast uot forgot, 
Wherein I thee endow'd. 

Regain. Good sir, to the purpose. [Trumpets nithin. 

Lear. Who put n»y man i' the stocks ? 

Cornwall. What trumpet's that ? 

Enter Steward. 

Regan. I know't, my sister's : this approves her letter, 
That she would soon be here. — Is your lady come ;' 

Lear. This is a slave, whose easy boi row'd pride 

Dwells in the fickle grace of her he follows : 

Out, varlet, from my sight ! 

Cornwall. What means your grace ? 

Lear. Who stock'd my servant.^ Regan, I have good hope 
Thou did'st not know on't. — Who comes here'' O heavens, 

Enter GoNERii.t. 

If you do love old men, if your sweet sway j 

Allow obedience, if yourselves are old, 

Make it your cause j seod down, and take my part ! — 

Art not asham'd to look upon this beard .!^— . [To Gonerill. 

O, Regan, wilt thou take her by the hand p 



168 LEAR. 

Gonerill Why not by the hand, sir ," How have I offended ? 
All's noi ofFefice, that indiscretion finds, 
And dotage terms so. 

Lear. O, sides, you are too tough I 
Will you yet hold • — How came my man i' the stocks ? 

Cornwall. I set him there, sir; but his own disorders 
DeservM much less advancement. 

Lear. You ! did you j^ 
^ Regan. I pray you, f^ither, being weak, seem so. 
If, till the expiration of your month, 
You will return and sojourn with nty sister. 
Dismissing liaif your train, come then to me ; 
I am now from home, and out of that provision 
Which shall be needful for your eriiertainment. 

Lear. Reiiiin to her, and fifty m^n dismiss'd ? 
Ko, rather 1 abjure all roofs, and choose 

To be a comrade with the wolf ^nd owl 

To waj'e against the enmity o' the air, 

Necessity's sLiarp pinch ! Retin-n with her ! 

Why, the hot-blooded France, th^it dowerless took 
Our youngest born, I could as well be bmusrht 
To knee his throne, and squire- like pensiOi; beg 

To keep base life afoot. Return with her ! 

Persuade mr rather to be slave and sumpter 

To thi? detested groom. [Looking on the Stercard. 

Gonerill. At your choice, sir. 

Lear. Now, I pr'ythee, daugliter, do not make me mad ; 
I will not trouble thee, my child j farewell : 

We'll no more meet, no more see one another : 

But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter ; 

Or, ralliei', a disease that's in my flesh, 

Wliich 1 must rueds call mine : thou art a bile, 

A plague-sore, an embossed carbuncie. 

In my corrupted blood. Ful I'll not cltide thee ; 

Lei <hame couie when it will, I do not call it : 

I did nol bid the thunder-bearer shoot, 

Kor tell tales of tline to high jud<;ing Jove : 

M'-tid, when thou can-st ; be hetter, at thy leisure : 

I cau bf patient ; ! can stay wilh Regan, 

J, and my hundred knigiits. 

Regan. Not altogeiher %o, sir ; 
I look'd not for you yet, nor am provided 



LEAR. 169 

For your fit welcome : Give ear, sir, to my sister ; 
For those that mingle reason with your passion 

Must be content to think you old, and so— 

But she knows what she does. 

Lear. Is this well spoken now p 

Regan. I dare avouch it, sir : What, fifty followers i' 
Is it not well ? What should you need of more ? 
Yea, or so many ? Sith that both charge and danger 
Speak 'gainst so great a number ? How, in one house, 
Should many people, under two commands, 
Hold amity p 'Tis hard ; almost impossible. 

Gonerill. Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance 
From those that slie calls servants, or from mine p 

Regan. Why not, ray lord ? If then they chanc'd to slack 
you, 
We would control them : if you will come to me 
(For now I spy a danger) I entreat you 
To bring but five and-twenty ; to no more 
Will I give place, or notice. 

Lear. I gave you all 

Regan. And in good time you gave it, 

Lear. Made you my guardians, my depositaries ; 
But kept a reservation to be follow 'd 
With such a number : what, must I come to you 
With five and twenty, Regan ! said you so ? 

Regan. And speak it again, my lord .; no more with me. 

Lear. Those wicked creatures yet do look well-fa vour'd, 
When others are more wicked ; not being tiie worst, 

Stands in some rank of praise : I'll go with thee ; 

[To Gonerill. 
Thy fifty yet doth double five and twenty, 
And tliou art twice her love. 

Gonerill. Hear me, my lord ; 
What need you five and twenty, ten, or five, 
To follow iu a house, where twice so many 
Have a comra \nd to tend you P 

Regan. W hat need one ? 

Lear. O, reason not the need : our basest beggars 
Are in the poorest thing superfluous : 
Allow not nature more than nature needs, 
15 



i 7^ LEAR. 

Man's life is cheap as beast's : thou art a lady ; 

If only to go warm were gorgeous, 

Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear'st ; 

Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true need— — — 

You heavens, give me that patience which I need ! 

You see me here, you gods; a poor old man, 

As full of grief as age; wretched in both ! 

If it be you that stir these daughters' hearts 

Against their father, fool me not so much 

To bear it tamely ; touch ine with noble anger ! 

O, let no woman's weapons, water-drops, 

Stain ray man's cheeks I No, you unnatural hags, 

I will have such revenges on you both, 

That all the world shall 1 will do such things 

What they are, yet I know not ; but they shall be 
The terrours of the earth. You think, I'll weep : 

No, I'll not weep : 

1 have full cause of weeping ; but this heart 
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws, 

Or e'er I'll weep : O, fool, I shall go mad ! 

' [Exeunt Lear., Gloster, Kenty and FooV 

if there is any thing in any author like this yearn- 
ing of the heart, these throes of tenderness, this 
profound expression of all that can be thought and 
felt in the most heart-rending situations, "\ve are glad 
of it ; but it is in some author that we have not 
read. 

The scene in the storm, where he is exposed to 
all t,he fury of the elements, though grand and 
terrible, is not so fine, but the moralizing scenes 
with Mad Tom, Kent, and Gloster, are upon a par 
with the former. His exclamation in the supposed 
trial-scene of his daughters, " See the little dogs 
and all, Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart, see, they 
bark at me ;" his issuing his orders, " Let them ana- 
tomize Regan, see what breeds about her heart," and 
his reflection when he sees the misery of Edgar, 



LEAR. 17' I 

" Nothing but his unkind daughters could have 
brought Mm to this," are in a style of pathos, where 
the extremest resources of the imagination are call- 
ed in to lay open the deepest movements of the 
heart, which was peculiar to Shakspeare. In the 
same style and spirit is his interrupting the Fool, 
who asks, " whether a madman be a gentleman or a 
yeoman," b}' answering *' A king, a king !" — 

The indirect part that Gloster takes in these 
scenes, where his generosity leads him to relieve 
Lear and resent the cruelty of his daughters, at the 
very time that he is himself instigated to seek the 
life of his son, and suffering under the sting of his 
supposed ingratitude, is a striking accompaniment to 
the situation of Lear. Indeed, the manner in which 
the threads of the story are woven together is al- 
most as wonderful in the way of art, as the carrying 
on the tide of j-^assion, still varying and unimpaired, 
is on the score of nature. Among the remarkable 
instances of this kind, are Edgar's meeting with his 
old blind father ; the deception he practises upon 
him when he pretends to lead him to the top of 
Dover-cliff — " Come on, sir, here's the place," to 
prevent his ending his life and miseries together; 
his encounter with the perfidious Steward, whom he 
kills, and his finding the letter from Gonerill to his 
brother upon him, which leads to the final catastro- 
phe, and brings the wheel of Justice " full circle 
home" to the guilty parties. The bustle and rapid 
succession of events in the last scenes is surprising. 
But the meeting between Lear and Cordelia is by 
far the most affecting part of them. It has all the 
wildueas of poetry, and all the heartfelt truth of na- 



172 LEAR. 

ture. The previous account of her reception of the 
news of his unkind treatment, her involuntary re- 
proaches to her sisters, " Shame, ladies, shame," 
Lear's backwardness to see his daughter, the pic- 
ture of the desolate state to which he is reduced, 
" Alack, 'tis be ; why he was met even now, as mad 
as the vex'd sea, singing aloud," only prepare the 
way for and heighten our expectation of what fol- 
lows, and assuredly this expectation is not disap- 
pointed, when, through the tender care of Cordelia he 
revives and recollects her. 

" Cordelia. How does my royal lord ? How fares your ma- 
jesty ! 

Lear. You do me wrong, to take ine oat o' the grave : 
Thou art a soul in bliss ; but I am bound 
Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears 
Do scald like molten lead. 

Cordelia. Sir, do you know me? 

Lear. You are a spirit 1 know : when did you diep 

Cordelia. Still, still, far wide ! 

Physician. He's scarce awake ; let him alone awhile. 

Lear. Where have I been ? Where am I !' — Fair day- 
light? 

I am mightily abus'd.— I should even die with pity, 

To see another thus.— I know not what to say. 

I will not swear these are my hands : — let's see j 
I feel this pin prick. 'Would I were assur'd 
Of my condition. 

Cordelia. O, look upon me, sir, 

And hold your hands in benediction o'er me : 

No, sir, you must not kneel. 

Lear. Pray, do not mock me : 
I am a very foolish fond old man, 
Fourscore and upward ; 

Not an hour more, nor less : and, to deal plainly, 
I fear, I am not in my perfect mind. 
Methinks, I shou'd know you, and know this man j 
Yet I am doubtful : for I am mainly ignorant 



LEAR. 173 

What place this is ; and all tbe skill I have 
Remembers not these garments ; nor I know not 
Where I did lodge last night : do not laugh at me ; 
For, as I am a man, I think tliis lady 
To be my child Cordelia. 

Cordelia. And so I am, I am !" 

Almost equal to this in awful beauty is their con- 
solatioQ of each other, when, after the triumph of 
their enemies, they are led to prison. 

" Cordelia. We are not the first, 
W ho, with best meaning, have incurr'd the worst. 
For thee, oppressed king, am I cast down ! 
Myself conid else oiit-frown false fortune's frown. — 
Shall we not see these daughters, and these sisters ? 

Lear. No, no, no, no ! Come, let's away to prison : 
We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage: 
When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, 
And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live, 
And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh 
At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues 
Talk of court news ; and we'll talk with ihem too — 
Who loses, and who wins ; who's iu, who's out ; — 
And take upon us the mystery of things. 
As if we were God's spies : and we'll wear out, 
In a wall'd prison, packs and sects of great ones, 
That ebb and flow by the moon. 

Edmund. Take them away. 

Lear. Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia, 
The gods themselves throw incense." 

The concluding events are sad, painfully sad ; but 
their pathos is extreme. The oppression of the 
feelings is relieved by tbe very interest we t<ike in 
the misfortunes of others, and by the reflections to 
which they give birth. Cordelia is hanged in prison 
by the orders of the bastard Edmund, which are 
15 * 



17^4 LEAR. 

known too late to be countermanded, and Lear dies 
broken-hearted, lamenting over her. 

" Lear. And my poor fool is hanged ! No, no, no life : 
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, 
And thou no breath at all ? O, thou wilt come no more, 

Never, never, never, never, never !^ 

Pray you, undo this button : thank you sir." 

He dies, and indeed we feel the truth of what 
Kent says on the occasion — 

" Vex not his ghost : O, let him pass ! he hates him, 
That would upon the rack of this rough world 
Stretch him out longer." 

Yet a happy ending has been contrived for this 
play, which is approved of by Dr. Johnson and con- 
demned by Schlegel. A better authority than either 
on any subject in which poetry and feeling are 
concerned, has given it in favour of Shakspeare, 
in some remarks on the acting of Lear, with which 
we shall conclude this account. 

" The Lear of Shakspeare cannot be acted. 
The contemptible machinery with which they mi- 
mick the storm which he goes out in, is not more 
inadequate to represent the horrours of the real 
elements, than any actor can be to represent Lear. 
The greatness of Lear is not in corporal dimension, 
but in intfllectual; the exj)losions of his passions 
are terrible as a volcano : they are storms turning 
Vp and disclosing to the bottom that rich sea, his 
mind, with all its vast riches. It is his mind 
which is laid bare. This case of flesh and blood 
seems loo insignificant to be thought on ; even as 
he himself neglects it. On the stage we see no- 



LEAR. 175 

thing but corporal infirmities and weakness, the im- 
potence of rage ; while we read it, we see not Lear, 
but we are Lear; — we are in his mind, we are sus- 
tained by a grandeur, which baffles the malice of 
daughters and storms ; in the aberrations of his 
reason, we discover a mighty irregular power of 
reasoning, immethodized from the ordinary purposes of 
life, but exerting its pov\ers, as the wind blows where 
it listeth, at will, on the corruptions and abuses of 
mankind. What have looks or tones to do with 
that sublime identification of his age with that of 
the heavens themselves, when, in his reproaches to 
them for conniving at the injustice of his children, 
he reminds them that " they themselves are old!" 
What gesture shall we api)ropriate to this ? What 
has the voice or the eye to do with such things ? 
But the play is beyond all art, as the tamperings 
with it shew : it is too hard and stony : it must 
have love scenes, and a happy ending. It is not 
enough that Cordelia is a daughter, she must shine 
as a lover too. Tate has put his hook in the nos- 
trils of this Leviathan, for Garrick and his follow- 
ers, the shewmen of the scene, to draw it about 
more easily. A happy ending ! — as if the living 
martyrdom that Lear had gone through, — the flay- 
ing of his feelings alive, did not make a fair dis- 
missal from the stage of life the only decorous thing 
for him. If he is to live and be happy after, if he 
could sustain this world's burden after, why all this 
pudder and preparation — why torment us with all 
this unjiecessary sympathy ? As if the childish 
pleasure of getting his gilt robes and sceptre again 
could tempt him to act over again his misused sta- 



176 LEAH. 

tioji, — as if at his years and with his experience, 
any thing was left but to die."* 

Four things have struck us in reading Lear : 

1. That poetry is an interesting study, for this 
reason, that it relates to whatever is most interesting 
in human life. Whoever therefore has a contempt 
for poetry, has a contempt for himself and huma- 
nity. 

2. That the language of poetry is superiour to 
the language of painting; because the strongest of 
our recollections relate to feelings, not to faces. 

3. That the greatest strength of genius is shewn 
in describing the strongest passions : for the power 
of the imagination, in works of invention, must be 
in proportion to the force of the natural impressions 
which are the subject of them. 

4. That the circumstance which balances the 
pleasure against the pain in tragedy is, that in pro- 
portion to the greatness of the evil, is our sense and 
desire of the opposite good excited ; and that our 
sympathy with actual suffering is lost in the strong 
impulse given to our natural affections, and carried 
away with the swelling tide of passion, that gushes 
from and relieves the heart. 

*• See an article, called Theatralia, in the second volume of the 
RefkctoT, by CUarles Lamb, 



RICHARD II, 



KicHARD II. is a play little known compared with 
Richard III.^ which last is a play that every un- 
fledged candidate for theatrical fame chooses to strut 
and fret his hour upon the stage in ; yet we confess 
that we prefer the nature and feeling of the one 
to the noise and bustle of the other ; at least, as 
we are so often forced to see it acted. In Richard 
II. the weakness of the king leaves us leisure to 
take a greater interest in the misfortunes of the man. 
After the first act, in which the arbitrariness of his 
behaviour only proves his want of resolution, we 
see him staggering under the unlooked-for blows of 
fortune, bewailing his loss of kingly power, not pre- 
venting it, sinking under the aspiring genius of 
Bolingbroke, his authority trampled on, his hopes 
failing him, and his pride crushed and broken down 
under insults and injuries, which his own miscon- 
duct had provoked, but which he has not courage or 
manliness to resent. The change of tone and 
behaviour in the two competitors for the throne ac- 
cording to their change of fortune, from the capri- 



178 RICHARD II. 

cious sentence of banishment passed by Richard 
upon BoUngbroke, the suppHant offers and modest pre- 
tensions of the latter on his return, to the high and 
haughty tone with which he accepts Richard's resig- 
nation of the crown after the loss of all his power, 
the use which he makes of the deposed king to grace 
his triumphal progress through the streets of Lon- 
don, and the final intimation of his wish for his 
death, which immediately finds a servile execution- 
er, is marked throughout with complete effect, and 
without the slightest appearance of effort. The 
steps by which Bolingbroke mounts tlie throne are 
those by which Richard sinks into the grave. We 
feel neither respect nor love for the deposed mon- 
arch; for he is as wanting in energy as in principle : 
but we pity him, for he pities himself. His heart is 
by no means hardened against himself, but bleeds 
afresh at every new stroke of mischance, and his 
sensibility, absorbed in his own person, and unused 
to misfortune, is not only tenderly alive to its own 
sufferings, but without the fortitude to bear them. 
He is, however, human in his distresses; for to feel 
pain and sorrow, weakness, disappointment, remorse 
and anguish, is the lot of humanity, and we sympa- 
thize with him accordingl3^ The sufferings of the 
man make us forget that he ever was a king. 

The right assumed by sovereign pow'er to trifle at 
its will with the happiness of others as a matter of 
course, or to remit its exercise as a matter of favour, 
is strikingly shewn in the sentence of banishment 
so unjustly pronounced on Bolingbroke and Mow- 
bray, and in what Bolingbroke says when four years 
of his banishment are taken off, with as little reason. 



RICHARD II. 179 

" How long a time lies in one little word ! 
Four lagging winters and four wanton springs 
End in a word : such is the breath of kings." 

A more affecting image of the loneliness of a 
stiate of exile can hardly be given, than by what 
Bolingbroke afterwards observes of his having *' sigh- 
ed his English breath in foreign clouds ;" or than 
that conveyed in Mowbray's complaint at being ban- 
ished for life. 

" The language I have learned these forty years, 
My native English, now I must forego ; 
And now my tongue's use is to me no more 
Than an unstringed viol or a harp, 
Or like a cunning instrument cas'd up, 
Or being open, put into his hands 
That knovvs no touch to tune the harmony. 
- I am too old to fawn upon a nurse, 
Too far in years to be a pupil now." — 

How very beautiful is all this, and at the same time 
how very English too ! 

Richard II. may be considered as the first of that 
series of English historical plays, in which "is hung 
armour of the invincible knights of old," in which 
their hearts seem to strike against their coats of mail, 
where their blood tingles for the fight, and words are 
but the harbingers of blows. Of this state of ac- 
complished barbarism the appeal of Bolingbroke and 
Mowbray is an admirable specimen. Another of 
these " keen encounters of their wits," which serve 
to whet the talkers' swords, is where Aumerle an- 
swers in the presence of Bolingbroke to the charge, 
which Bagot brings against him, of being an accessary 
in Gloster's death. 



ISa RICHARD IL 

^^Fitzwater. If that thy valour stand on sympathies, 
There is my gage, Aumerle, in gage to thine j 
By that fair sun that shows me wliere thou stand'st 
I heard thee say, and vauntingly thou spak'st it, 
That thou wert cause of noble Gloster's death. 
If thou deny'st it twenty times, thou liest. 
And I will turn thy falsehood to thy heart 
Where it was forged, with my rapier's point. 

Aumerle. Thou dar'st not, coward, live to see the day. 

Fiisrvater. Now, by my soul, I would it were this hour. 

Aumerle. Fitzwater, thou art damn'd to hell for this. 

Percy, Aumerle, thou liest ; his honour is as true, 
In this appeal, as thou art all unjust ; 
And that thou art so, there I throw my gage 
To prove it on thee, to th' extremest point 
Of mortal breathing. Seize it, if thou dar'st. 

Aumerle. And if I do not, may my hands rot off, 
And never brandish more revengeful steel 
Over the glittering helmet of my foe. 
Who sets me else? By heav'n, I'll throw at all. 
I have a thousand spirits in my breast. 
To answer twenty thousand such as you. 

Surry. My lord Fitzwater, I remember well 
The very time Aumerle and you did talk. 

Fitzwater. My lord, 'tis true : you were in presence then ; 
And you can witness with me, this is true. 

Surry. As false, by heav'n, as heav'n itself is true. 

Fitz7vater. Surry, thou liest. 

Surry. Dishonourable boy, 
That lie shall lye so heavy on my sword. 
That it shall render vengeance and revenge, 
Till thou the lie-giver and that lie rest 
In earth as quiet as thy father's skull. 
In proof whereof, there is mine honour's pawn : 
Engage it to the trial, if thou dar'st. 

Fitzimter. How fondly dost thou spur a forward horse • 
If I dare eat, or drink, or breathe, or live, 
I dare meet Surry in a wilderness, 
And spit upon bim, whilst 1 say he lies, 
And lies, and lies : there is my bond of faith, 



RICHARD II. 181 

To tie thee to thy strong correction. 

As I do hope to thrive in this new world, 

Aumerle is guilty of my true appeal." 

The truth is, that there is neither truth nor honour 
in all these noble persons : they answer words with 
words, as they do blows with blows, in mere self- 
defence : nor have they any principle whatever but 
that of courage in maintaining any wrong they dare 
commit, or any falsehood which they find it useful 
to assert. How different were these noble knights 
and " barons bold" from their more refined descend- 
ants in the present day, who, instead of deciding 
questions of right by brute force, refer every thing 
to convenience, fashion, and good breeding ! In point 
of any abstract love of truth or justice, they are just 
the same now that they were then. 

The characters of old John of Gaunt and of his 
brother York, uncles to the King, the one stern and 
foreboding, the other honest, good-natured, doing all 
for the best, and therefore doing nothing, are well 
kept up. The speech of the former, in praise of En- 
gland, is one of the most eloquent that ever was pen- 
ned. We should perhaps hardly be disposed to feed 
the pampered egotism of our countrymen by quoting 
this description, were it not that the conclusion of it 
(which looks prophetick) may qualify any improper 
degree of exultation. 

" This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, 
This earth of Majesty, this seat of Mars, 
This other Eden, demi-Paradise, 
This fortress built by nature for herself 
Against infection and the hand of war j 
This happy breed of men, this little world, 
16 



182 RICHARD II. 

This precious stoue set in the silver sea, 
Which serves it in the office of a wall 
(Or as a moat defensive to a house) 
Against the envy of less happy lands : 
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings, 
Fear'd for their breed and famous for their birth, 
Renowned for their deeds, as far from home. 
For Christian service and true chivalry, 
As is the sepulchre iu stubborn Jewry 
Of the world's ransom, blessed Mary's son'; 
This land of such dear souls, this dear, dear land. 
Dear for her reputation through the world, 
Is now leas'd out (I die pronouncing it) 
Like to a tenement or pelting farm. 
England bound in with the triumphant sea, 
Whose rocky shore beats back the envious surge 
Of wat'ry Neptune, is bound in with shame. 
With inky blots and rotten parchment bonds. 
That England, that was wont to conquer others. 
Hath made a shameful conquest of itself " 

The character of Bolingbroke, afterwards Henry 
IV., is drawn with a masterly hand : — patient for oc- 
casion, and then steadily availing himself of it, seeing 
his advantage afar off, but only seizing on it when he 
has it within his reach, humble, crafty, bold and as- 
piring, encroaching by regular but slow degrees, 
building power on opinion, and cementing opinion by 
power. His disposition is first unfolded by Richard 
himself, w ho however is too self-willed and secure to 
make a proper use of his knowledge. 

" Ourself and Bushy, Bagot here and Green, 
Observed his courtship of the common people : 
How he did seem to dive into iheir hearts, 
With humble and familiar courtesy. 
What reverence he did throw away on slaves; 
Wooing poor craftsmen with the craft of smiles, 
And patient under-bearing of his fortune, 



RICHARD ir. 183 

As 'twere to banish their affections with hira. 

Off goes his bonnet to an oyster wench ; 

A brace of draymen bid God speed him well, 

And had the tribute of his supple knee, 

With, thanks my countrymen, my loving friends ; 

As were our England in reversion his, 

And he our subjects' next degree in hope," 

Afterwards, he gives his own character to Percy, in 
these words : 

" I thank thee, gentle Percy, and be sure 
I count myself in nothing else so happy, 
As in a soul rememb'ring my good friends ; 
And as my fortune ripens with tliy love, 
It shall be still thy true love's recompense." 

We know how he afterwards kept his promise. 
His bold assertion of his own rights, his pretended 
submission to the king, and the ascendancy which he 
tacitly assumes over him without openly claiming 
it, as soon as he has him in his power, are cha- 
racteristick traits of this ambitious and politick 
usurper. But (he part of Richard himself gives the 
chief interest to the play. His folly, his vices, 
his misfortunes, his reluctance to part with the 
crown, his fear to keep it, his weak and woman- 
ish regrets, his starting tears, his fits of hectick 
passion, his smothered majesty, pass in succession 
before us, and make a picture as natural as it is 
affecting. Among the most striking touches of pathos 
are his wish " O that I were a mockery king of snow, 
to melt away before the sun of Bolingbroke," and 
the incident of the poor groom who comes to visit 
him in prison, and tells him how " it yearned his 
heart, that Bolingbroke, upon his coronation day, rode 



184 RICHARD II. 

on Roan Earbary." We shall have occasion to 
return hereafter to the character of Richard II., io 
speaking of Henry VI. There is only one passage 
more, the description of his entrance into London 
with Bolingbroke, which we should like to quote here, 
if it had not been so used and worn out, so thumbed 
and got by rote, so praised and painted ; but its 
beauty surmounts all these considerations. 

" Duchess. My lord, yoii told me you would tell the rest, 
When weeping made you break the story oflF 
Of our two cousins coming into London. 

York. Where did 1 leave? 

Duchess, At that sad stop, my lord, 
Where rude misgovern'd hands, from window tops, 
Threw dust and rubbish on king Richard's head. 

York. Then, as I said, the duke, great Bolingbroke, 
Mounted upon a hot and fiery steed, 
Which his aspiring rider seem'd to know, 
With slow but stately pace, kept on his course, 
While all tongues cried — God save thee, Bolingbroke ! 
You would have thought the very windows spake, 
So many greedy looks of young and old 
Through casercents darted their desiring eyes 
Upon his visage ; and that all the walls. 
With painted imag'ry, had said at once — 
Jesu preserve thee ! welcome, Bolingbroke ! 
Whilst he, from one side to the other turning, 
Bare-headed, lower than his proud steed's neck, 
Bespake them thus — 1 thank you, countrymen : 
And thus still doing thus he pass'd along. 

Duchess. Alas, poor Richard ! where rides he the while ? 

York. As in a theatre, the eyes of men. 
After a well grac'd actor leaves the stage. 
Are idly bent on him that enters next. 
Thinking his prattle to be tedious : 
Even so, or with much more contempt, men's eyes 
Did scowl on Richard j no man cried, God save him ! 
No joyful tongue gave him his welcome home : 



RICHARD II. 185 

But dust was thrown upon his sacred head ! 
Which with such gentle sorrow he shook off — 
His face still combating with tears and smiles. 
The badges of his grief and piitience — 
That had not God, for some strong purpose, steelM 
The hearts of men, they must perforce have melted, 
And barbarism itself have pitied him." 



16 



HENRY IV. 



IN TTVO PARTS. 



If Shakspeare's fondness for the ludicrous some, 
times led to faults in his tragedies (which was not 
often the case) he has made us amends by the cha- 
racter of Falstaff. This is perhaps the most sub- 
stantial comick character that ever was invented. 
Sir John carries a most portly presence in the mind's 
eye ; and in him, not to speak it profanely, *' we 
behold the fullness of the spirit of wit and humour 
bodily." We are as well acquainted with his person 
as his mind, and his jokes come upon us with double 
force and relish from the quantity of flesh through 
which they make their way, as he shakes his fat sides 
with laughter, or " lards the lean earth as he walks 
along." Other comick characters seem, if we ap- 
proach and handle them, to resolve themselves into 
air, " into thin air;'' but this is embodied and pal- 
pable to the grossest apprehension : it lies " three 
fingers deep upon the ribs," it plays about the lungs 
and the diaphragm with ail the force of animal 
enjoyment. His body is like a good estate to 



HENRY IV. 187 

his miQii, from which he receives rents and reve- 
nues of profit and pleasure in kind, according to its 
extent, and the richness of the soil. Wit is often 
a meagre substitute for pleasurable sensation ; an 
effusion of spleen and petty spite at the comforts 
of others, from feeling none in itself. Falstaff's wit 
is an emanation of a fine constitution; an exube- 
rance of good-humour and good-nature ; an overflow- 
ing of his love of laughter, and good-fellowship ; 
a giving vent to his heart's ease and over-content- 
ment with himself and others. He would not be 
in character, if he were not so fat as he is ; for there 
is the greatest keeping in the boundless luxury 
of his imagination and the pampered self-indulgence 
of his physical appetites. He manures and nourishes 
his mind with jests, as he does his body with sack 
and sugar. He carves out his jokes, as he would 
a capon, or a haunch of venison, where there is 
cut and come again ; and pours out upon them the 
oil of gladness. His tongue drops fatness, and in 
the chambers of his brain " it snows of meat and 
drink." He keeps up perpetual holiday and open 
house, and we live with him in a round of invita- 
tions to a rump and dozen. — Yet we are not to 
suppose that he was a mere sensualist. All this 
is as much in imagination as in reality. His 
sensuality does not engross and stupify his other 
faculties, but " ascends me into the brain, clears 
away all the dull, crude vapours that environ it, and 
makes it full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes." 
His imagination keeps up the ball after his senses 
have done with it. He seems to have even a 
greater enjoyment of the freedom from restraint, of 



188 HEXRY IT. 

good cheer, of his ease, of his vanity, in the ideal 
exaggerated descriptions which he gives of them, 
than in fact. He never fails to enrich his discourse 
with allusions to eating and drinking, but we never 
see him at table. He carries his own larder about 
with him, and he is himself "a tun of man." His 
pulling out the bottle in the field of battle is a 
joke to shew his contempt for glory accom[»anied 
with danger, his sjstematick adherence to his 
Epicurean philosophy in the most trying circum- 
stances. Again, such is his delii.erate exaggeration 
of his own vices, that it does not seem quite certain 
whether the account of his hostess's bill, found 
in his pocket, with such an out of the way charge 
for capons and sack, with only one halfpenny-worth 
of bread, was not put there by himself as a trick to 
humour the jest u()on his favourite propensities, 
and as a conscious caricature of himself. He is 
represented as a liar, a braggart, a coward, a glutton, 
&c. and yet we are not offended but delighted 
with him ; for he is all Ihese as much to amuse 
others as to gratify himself. He openly assumes 
all these characters to shew the humorous part 
of them. The unrestrained indulgence of his own 
ease, appetites, and conveoienee. has neither malice 
nor hypocrisy in it. In a word, he is an actor in 
himself almost as much as upon the stage, and 
we no more object to the character of Falstaff, . 
in a moral point of view, than we should think of 
bringing an excellent comedian, who should re- 
present him to the life, before one of the police 
ofiBcers. We only consider the number of pleasant 
Mghts ia which he puts certain foibles, (the more 



HENRY IV. 189 

pleasant as they are opposed to the received rules 
and necessary restraints of society) and do not 
trouble ourselves about the consequences resulting 
from them, for no mischievous consequences do 
result. Sir John is old as well as fat, which gives a 
melancholy retrospective tinge to the character ; 
and, by the disparity between his inclinations and 
his capacity for enjoyment, makes it still more 
ludicrous and fantastical. 

The secret of Falstaff's wit is, for the most part, a 
masterly presence of mind, an absolute self-posses- 
sion, which nothing can disturb. His repartees are 
involuntary suggestions of his self-love; instinctive 
evasions of every thing that threatens to interrupt 
the career of his triumphant jollity and self-compla- 
cency. His very size floats him out of all his 
difficulties in a sea of rich conceits ; and he turns 
round on the pivot of his convenience, with every 
occasion, and at a moment's warning. His natural 
repugnance to every unpleasant thought or circum- 
stance of itself makes light of objections, and pro- 
vokes the most extravagant and licentious answers 
in his own justification. His indifference to trutb 
puts no check upon his invention, and the more 
improbable and unexpected his contrivances are, the 
more happily does he seem to be delivered of them, 
the anticipation of their effect acting as a stimulus 
to the gayety of his fancy. The success of one 
adventurous sally gives him spirits to undertake 
another : he deals always in round numbers, and his 
exaggerations and excuses are " open, palpable, 
monstrous as the father that begets them." His 
dissolute carelessness of what he says discovers 
itself in the first dialogue with the Prince. 



190 HENRY IV. 

" Falstqff'. By the lord, thou say'st true, lad ; and is not mine 
hostess of the tavern a most sweet wench ? 

P. Henry. A s the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle ; and 
is not a buflF jerkin a most sweet robe of durance p 

Falstaff. How now, how now, mad wag, wlmt, in thy quips and 
thy quiddities ? what a plague have 1 to do with a buflf-jerkin ? 

P. Henry. Why, what a pox have I to do with mine hostess of 
the tavern ?'* 

In the same scene he afterwards affects melan- 
choly, from pure satisfaction of heart, and professes 
reform, because it is the farthest thing in the world 
from his thoughts. He has no qualms of conscience, 
and therefore would as soon talk of them as of any 
thing else when the humour takes him. 

^'■Falstnff. But Hal, I pr'ylhee trouble me no more with vanity. 
I would to God thou and I knew where a commodity of good names 
were to be bought: an old lord of council rated me the other 
day in the street about you, sir ; but 1 mark'd him not, and yet he 
talked very wisely, and in the street too. 

P. Henry. Thou didst well, for wisdom cries out in the street, 
and no man regards it. 

Falstaff. O, thou hast damnable iteration, and art indeed able to 
corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm unto me, Hal; God 
forgive thee for it. Before I knew thee, Hal, 1 knew nothing, and now 
I am, if a man should speak truly, little belter than one of the wick- 
ed. 1 must give over this life, and I will give it over, by the lord ; 
an I do not, I am a villain. Pll be damn'd for never a king's son in 
Christendom. 

P. Henry. Where shall we take a purse to-morrow, Jack ? 

Falstaff. Where thou wilt, lad, I'll make onej and I do not, call 
me villain, and baffle me. 

P. Henry. 1 see good amendment of life in thee, from praying 
to purse- taking. 

Falstaff. Why, Hal, 'tis my vocation, Hal. 'Tis no sin for a mau 
to labour in his vocation." 

Of the other prominent passages, his account of 
his pretended resistance to the robbers, " who grew 



HENRY IV. 191 

from four men in buckram into eleven," as the ima- 
gination of his own valour increased with his relating 
it, his getting off when the truth is discovered by 
pretending he knew the Prince, the scene in which, 
in the person of the old king, he lectures the prince 
and gives himself a good character, the soliloquy 
on honour, and description of his new raised re- 
cruits, his meeting with the Chief justice, his abuse 
of the Prince and Poins, who overhear him, to Doll 
Tearsheet, his reconciliation with Mrs. Quickly, who 
has arrested him for an old debt, and whom he per- 
suades to pawn her plate to lend him ten pounds 
more, and the scenes with Shallow and Silence, are 
all inimitable. Of all of them, the scene in which 
Falstaff plays the part, tirst, of the King, and then 
of Prince Henry, is the one that has been the most 
often quoted. We must quote it once more in illus- 
tration of our remarks. 

*' Falstaff. Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy 
time, but also how thou art accompanied ■> for though the camomile, 
the more it is trodden on, the faster it grows, yet youth, the more it 
is wasted, the sooner it wears. That thou art my son, I have partly 
thy mother's word, partly my own opiiiion ; but chiefly, a villanous 
trick of thine eye, and a foolish hanging of thy nether lip, that doth 

warrant me. If then thou be son to me, here lies the point ; 

Why, being son to me, art thou so pointed at p Shall the blessed sun 
of heaven prove a raicher, and eat blackberries? A queslicu not to 
be ask'd. Shall the son of England prove a thief, and take purses ? 
A question to be ask'd. There is a thing, Harry, which thou 
hast often heard of, and it is known to many in our land by tlie name 
of pitch : this pitch, as ancient writers do report, doth defile ; so 
doth the company thou keepest : for, Harry, now I do not speak to 
thee in drink, but in tears ; not in pleasure, but in passiou ; not in 
words only, but in woes also:— and yet theie is a virtuous man, whom 
I have often uoted in thy compauy, but I know not his nanje. 



192 HENRY IV. 

P. Henry. What manner of man, an it like your majesty? 
Falsinff. A goodly portly man, i' faith, and a corpulent ; of a 
cheerful look, a pleasing eye, and a most noble carriage ; and, as I 
think, his age some fifty, or, by'r-lady, inclining to threescore j and 
now I do remember me, his name is FalstaflF: if that man should be 
lewdly given, he decciveth me j for, Harry, I see virtue in his looks. 
If then the fruit may be known by the tree, as the tree by the fruit, 
then peremptorily I speak it, there is virtue in that Falstaff : him 
keep with, the rest banish. And tell me now, thou naughty varlet, 
tell me, where hast thou been this month.'' 

P. Henry. Dost thou speak like a king ? Do thou stand for me, 
and I'll play my father, 

Falstaff. Depose me ? if thou dost it half so gravely, so majes- 
tically, both in word and matter, hang me up by the heels for a rab- 
bit-sucker, or a poulterer's hare. 
P. Henry. Well, here I am set. 
Falstaff. And here I stand :— judge, my laasters. 
P. Henry. Now, Harry, whence come you ? 
Falstaff. My noble lord, from Eastcheap. 
P. Henry. The complaints I hear of tliee are grievous. 
Falstaff. S'blood, my lord, they are false: — nay, I'll tickle ye 
for a young prince, i'faith. 

P. Henry. Swearest thou, ungracious boy ? henceforth ne'er look 
on me. Thou art violently carried away from grace : there is a 
devil haunts thee, in the likeness of a fat old man ; a tun of man is 
thy companion. Why dost thou converse with that trunk of hu- 
mours, that bolting-hutch of beastliness, that swoln parcel of drop- 
sies, that huge bombard of sack, that stuft cloak bag of guts, that 
roasted Manning-tree ox with the pudding in his belly, that rever- 
end vice, that grey iniquity, that father ruffian, that vanity in years ? 
wherein is he good, but to taste sack and drink it.'' wherein neat and 
cleanly, but to carve a capon and eat itp wherein cunning, but 
in craft.'' wherein crafty, but in villany i* wherein villanous, but in 
all things P wherein worthy, but in nothing ? 

Falstaff. I would, yoiir grace would take me with you i whom 
means your grace ? 

P. Henry. Tiiat villanous, abominable misleader of youth, Fal- 
staflF, that old white-bearded Satan. 
Falstaff. My lord, the man 1 know. 
P. Henry, i know thou dost. 



HENRY IV. 193 

Falstaff. But to say, I know more harm in hiin than in myself, 
were to say more than I know. That he is eld (the more the pity) 
his white hairs do witness it : but that he is (saving your reverence) 
a whoremaster, that I utterly deny. If sack and sugar be a fault, 
God help the wicked ! if to be old and merry be a sin, then many an 
old host tliat I know is damned : if to be fat be to be hated, then 
Pharoah's lean kine are to be loved. No, my good lord ; banish Peto, 
banish Bardolph, banish Poins : but for sweet Jack F^alstafF, kind Jack 
Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore more 
valiant, being as he is, old Jack Falstaff, banish not him thy Harry's 
company ; banish plump Jack, and banish all the world. 

P. Henry. 1 do, I will. 

[Knocking ; and Hostess and Bardolph go out. 

Reenter Bardolph, running. 

Bardolph. O, my lord, my lord } the sheriff, with a most mon- 
strous watch, is at the door. 

Falstaff. Out, you rogue ! play out the play : I have much to 
say in the behalf of that Falstaff." 

One of the most characteristick descriptions of 
Sir John is that which Mrs. Quickly gives of him 
when he asks her " What is the gross sum that I 
owe thee ?" 

" Hostess. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, tltyself, and the 
money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel -gilt goblet, 
sitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal 
fire, on Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke thy 
head for likening his father to a singing man of Windsor ; thou didst 
Ewear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and 
make me my lady thy wife. Canst thou deny it p Did not good- 
wife Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me gossip 
Quickly p coming in to borrow a mess of viuegar j telling us she had 
a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst desire to eat some; 
whereby I told thee, they were ill for a green wound p And didst 
thou not, when she was gone down stairs, desire me to be no more 
80 familiarity with such poor people ; saying, that ere long they 
should call me madam ? And didst thou not kiss me, and bid me 
fetch thee thirty shillings? I put thee now to thy book oath ; deny 
it if thou canst." 

17 



^94 HENRY IV. 

This scene is to us the most convincing prooi 
of Falstaflf's poAver of gaining over the good will 
of those he was familiar with, except indeed Bar- 
dolph's somewhat profane exclamation on hearing 
the account of his death, *' Would I were with 
him, wheresoe'er he is, whether in heaven or hell." 

One of the topicks of exulting superiority over 
others most common in Sir John's mouth, is his 
corpulence, and the exterior marks of good Jiving 
which he carries about him, thus " turning his vices 
into commodity." He accounts for the friendship 
between the Prince and Poins, from "their legs 
being both of a bigness ; and compares Justice 
Shallow to " a man made after supper of a cheese- 
paring." There cannot be a more striking grada- 
tion of character than that between Falstaflf and 
Shallow, and Shallow and Silence. It seems diffi- 
cult at first to fall lower than the squire; but this 
fool, great as he is, finds an admirer and humble 
foil in his cousin Silence. Vain of his acquaintance 
with Sir John, who makes a butt of him, he ex- 
claims, " Would, cousin Silence, that thou hadst 
seen that which this knight and I have seen !" — 
*' Aye, Master Shallow, we have heard the chimes 
at midnight," says Sir John. To Falstaff's obser- 
vation " I did not think Master Silence had been a 
man of this mettle," Silence answers, " Who, I ? I 
have been merry twice and once ere now." What 
an idea is here conveyed of a prodigality of living? 
What good husbandry and economical self-denial in 
his pleasures ? What a stock of lively recollec- 
tions ? It is curious that Shakspeare has ridiculed 
in Justice Shallow, who was " in some authority 



HENRY IV. 195 

under the king," that disposition to unmeaning tau- 
tology which is the regal infirmiiy of later times, 
and which, it may be supposed, he acquired from 
talking to his cousin Silence, and receiving no an- 
swers. 

'■^ Falstaff. You have here a goodly dwelling, and a rich. 

Shallow. Barren, barren, barren ; beggars all, beggars all, Sir 
John : marry, good air. Spread Davy, spread Davy. Weil said, 
Davy. 

Fulstaff. This Davy serves you for good uses. 

Shallow. A good varlet, a good varlet, a very good varlet. By 
the mass, I have drank loo much sack at supper. A good varlet. 
Now sit down, now sit down. Come, cousin." 

The true spirit of humanity, the thorough know- 
ledge of the stuff we are made of, the practical wis- 
dom with the seeming fooleries in the whole of the 
garden scene at Shallow's country seat, and just 
before in the exquisite dialogue between him and 
Silence on the death of old Double, have no paral- 
lel any where else. In one point of view, they are 
laughable in the extreme ; in another they are equally 
afifecting, if it is affecting to shew 7vhat a little thing- 
is human life, what a poor forked creature man is ! 

The heroick and serious part of these two plays, 
founded on the story of Henry IV., is not infe- 
riour to the comick and farcical. The characters 
of Hotspur and Prince Henry are two of the most 
beautiful and dramatick, both in themselves and 
from contrast, that ever were drawn. They are the 
essence of chivalry. We like Hotspur the best 
upon the whole, perhaps because he was unfortu- 
nate. — The characters of their fathers, Henry IV., 
and old Northumberland, are kept up equally well. 



196 HENRY IV. 

Henry naturally succeeds by his prudence and cau- 
tion in keeping wliat he has got; Northumberland 
fails in his enterprise from an excess of the same 
quality, and is caught in the web of his own cold, 
dilatory policy. Owen Glendower is a masterly 
character. It is as bold and original as it is intelli- 
gible and thoroughly natural. The disputes be- 
tween him and Hotspur are managed with infinite 
address and insight into nature. We cannot help 
pointing out here some very beautiful lines, where 
Hotspur describes the tight between Glendower and 
Mortimer. 

" ^Vhen, on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank, 

In single opposition, hand to hand, 

He did confound the best part of an hour 

In changing hardiment with great Glendower : 

Three times they breath'd, and three times did they drink, 

Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood ; 

Who then affrighted with their bloody looks, 

Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds, 

And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank, 

Blood-stained with these valiant combatants," 

The peculiarity and the excellence of Shakspeare's 
poetry is, that it seems as if he made his imagination 
the handmaid of nature, and nature the plaything 
of his imagination. He appears to have been all the 
characters, and in all the situations he describes. It 
is as if either he had had all their feelings, or had 
lent them all his genius to express themselves. — 
There cannot be stronger instances of this than Hot- 
spur's rage when Henry IV. forbids him to speak of 
Mortimer, his insensibility to all that his father and 
uncle urge to calm him, and his fine abstractedjapos- 
trophe to honour, "By heaven methinks it were an 



HENRY IV. 197 

easy leap to pluck bright honour from the moon," 
&c. After all, notwithstanding the gallantry, gene- 
rosity, good temper, and idle freaks of the mad-cap 
Prince of Wales, we should not have been sorry, if 
Northumberland's force had come up in time to de- 
cide the fate of the battle at Shrewsbury ; at least, 
we always heartily sympathize with Lady Percy's 
grief, when she exclaims, 

" Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers, 
To-day might I (hanging on Hotspur's neck) 
Have talked of Monmouth's grave." 

The truth is, that we never could forgive the 
Prince's treatment of Falstafif ; though perhaps Shak- 
speare knew what was best, according to the history, 
the nature of the times, and of the man. We speak 
only as dramatick criticks. Whatever terrour the 
French in those days might have of Henry V., yet 
to the readers of poetry at present, Falstaff is the 
better man of the two. We think of him and quote 
him oftener. 



17 



HENRY V. 



Henry V. is a very favourite monarch with the 
English nation, and he appears to have been also a 
favourite with Shakspeare, who labours hard to apo- 
logize for the actions of the king, by shewing us the 
character of the man, as " the king of good fellows.'* 
He scarcely deserves this honour. He was fond of 
war and low company : — we know little else of him. 
He was careless, dissolute, and ambitious ; — idle, or 
doing mischief. In private, he seemed to have no 
idea of the common decencies of life, which he sub- 
jected to a kind of regal license; in publick affairs, 
he seemed to have no idea of any rule of right or 
WTong, but brute force, glossed over with a little re- 
ligious hypocrisy and archi-episcopal advice. His 
principles did not change with his situation and pro- 
fessions. His adventure on Gadshill was a prelude 
to the affair of Agincourt, only a bloodless one ; 
Falstaffwasa puny [irompler of violence and outrage, 
compared with the pious and politick Archbishop of 
Canterbury, who gave the king carte hlanche, in a 
genealogical tree of his family, to rob and murder in 
circles of latitude and longitude abroad — to save the 
possessions of the church at home. This appears in 



HENRY V. 199 

the speeches in Shakspeare, where the hidden mo- 
tives that actuate princes and their advisers in war 
and policy are better laid open than in speeches from 
the throne or woolsack. Henry, because he did not 
know how to govern his own kingdom, determined to 
make war upon his neighbours. Because his own title 
to the crown was doubtful, he laid claim to that of 
France. Because he did not know how to exercise 
the enormous power, which had just dropped into his 
hands, to any one good purpose, be immediately un- 
dertook (a cheap and obvious resource of sovereignty) 
to do all the mischief he could. Even if absolute 
monarchs had the wit to find out objects of laudable 
ambition, they could onl}^ " plume up their wills" 
in adhering to the more sacred formula of the royal 
prerogative, " the right divine of kings to govern 
wrong," because will is only then triumphant when 
it is opposed to the will of others, because the pride 
of power is only then shewn, not when it consults 
the rights and interests of others, but when it insults 
and tramples on all justice and all humanity. Henry 
declares his resolution " when France is his, to bend 
it to his awe, or break it all to pieces" — a resolution 
worthy of a conqueror, to destroy all that he cannot 
enslave; and what adds to the joke, he lays all the 
blame of the consequences of his ambition on those 
who will not submit tamely to his tyranny. Such is 
the history of kingly power, from the beginning to 
the end of the world; — with this difference, that the 
object of war formerly, when the people adhered to 
their allegiance, was to depose kings ; the object lat- 
terly, since the people swerved from their allegiance, 
has been to restore kings, and to make common cause 



200 HENRY V. 

against mankind. The object of our late invasion 
and conquest of France was to restore the legitimate 
monarch, the descendant of Hugh Capet, to the 
throne : Henry V., in his time, made war on and de- 
posed the descendant of this very Hugh Capet, on the 
plea that he was a usurper and illegitimate. What 
would the great modern catspaw of legitimacy and 
restorer of divine right have said to the claim of Hen- 
ry and the title of the descendants of Hugh Capet ? 
Henry V., it is true, was a hero, a king of England, 
and the conqueror of the king of France. Yet we 
feel little love or admiration for him. He was a hero, 
that is, he was ready to sacrifice his own life for the 
pleasure of destroying thousands of other lives : he 
was a king of England, but not a constitutional one, 
and we only like kings according to the law ; lastly, 
he was a conqueror of the French king, and for this 
we dislike him less than if he had conquered the 
French people. How then do we like him ? We like 
him in the play. There he is a very amiable mon- 
ster, a very splendid pageant. As we like to gaze 
at a panther or a young lion in their cages in the 
Tower, and catch a pleasing horrour from their glis- 
tening eyes, their velvet paws, and dreadless roar* 
so we take a very romantick, heroick, patriotick, and 
poetical delight in the boasts and feats of our younger 
Harry, as (hey appear on the stage and are confined 
to lines of ten syllables; where no blood follows 
i-he stroke that wounds our ears, where no harvest 
bends beneath horses' hoofs, no city flames, no little 
child is butchered, no dead men's bodies are found 
piled on heaps and festering the next morning — ia 
the orchestra! 



HENRY V. 2(M 

So much for the politicks of this play ; now for the 
poetry. Perhaps one of the most striking images in 
all Shakspeare is that given of war in the tirst lines 
of the Prologue. 

'* O for a muse of fire, that would ascend 
The brightest heaven of invention, 
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, 
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene ! 
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself. 
Assume the port of Mars, and at his heels 
Leash''d in like hounds, should famine, sword, and Jirt 
Crouch for employment.^'' 

Rubens, if he had painted it, would not have im- 
proved upon this simile. 

The conversation between the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury and the Bishop of Ely relating to the sud- 
den change in the manners of Henry V. is among 
the well known Beauties of Shakspeare. It is in- 
deed admirable both for strength and grace. It has 
sometimes occurred to us that Shakspeare, in de- 
scribing " the reformation" of the Prince, might 
have had an eye to himself — 

•* Which is a wonder how his grace should glean it, 

Since his addiction was to courses vain, 

His companies unletfer'd, rude and shallow, 

His hours fill'd up with riots, banquets, sports ; 

And never noted in hira any study, 

Any retirement, any sequestration 

From open haunts and popularity. 

Ely. The strawberry grows underneath the nettle, 
And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best 
Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality : 
And ao the prince obscur'd his contemplation 
Under the veil of wildness, which no doubt 
Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night, ' 
Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty." 



202 HENRY V. 

This at least is as probable an account of the 
progress of the poet's mind, as we have met with 
in any of the Essays on the Learning of Shak- 
speare. 

Nothing can be better managed than the cau- 
tion which the king gives the meddling Archbishop, 
not to advise him rashly to engage in the war with 
France, his scrupulous dread of the consequences 
of that advice, and his eager desire to hear and 
follow it. 

"And God forbid, my dear and faithful lord, 
That you should fashion, wrest, or bovy your reading, 
Or nicely charge your understanding soul 
With opening titles miscreate, whose right 
Suits not in native colours with the truth. 
For. God doth know how many now in health 
Shall drop their blood, in approbation 
Of what your reverence shall incite us to. 
Therefore take heed how you impawn your person, 
How you awake our sleeping sword of war j 
We charge you in the name of God, take heed. 
For never two such kingdoms did contend 
Without much fall of blood, whose guiltless drops 
Are every one a wo, a sore complaint 
'Gainst him, whose wrong gives edge unto the swords 
That make such waste in brief mortality. 
Under this conjuration, speak, my lord j 
For we will hear, note, and believe in heart, 
That what you speak, is in your conscience wash'd, 
As pure as sin with baptism." 

Another characteristick instance of the blindness 
of human nature to every thing but its own interests, 
is the complaint made by the king of '* the ill neigh- 
bourhood" of the Scot in attacking England when 
she w^as attacking France. 



HENRY V. 203 

" For once the eagle England being in prey, 
To her unguarded nest the weazel Scot 
Comes sneaking, and so sucks her princely eggs." 

It is worth observing that in all these plays, 
which give an admirable picture of the spirit of the 
good old times t the moral inference does not at all 
depend upon the nature of the actions, but on the 
dignity or meanness of the persons committing them. 
" The eagle England" has a right " to be in prey," 
but " the weazel Scot" has none *' to come sneaking 
to her nest," which she has left to pounce upon 
others. Might was right, without equivocation or 
disguise, in that heroick and chivalrous age. The 
substitution of right for might, even in theory, is 
among the refinements and abuses of modern philo- 
sophy. 

A more beautiful rhetorical delineation of the ef- 
fects of subordination in a commonwealth can hardly 
be conceived than the following : — 

" For government, though-high and low and lower, 
Put into parts, doth keep in one consent, 
Congruing io a full and natural close, 
Like rausick. 

Therefore heaven doth divide 

The state of man in divers functions, 
Setting endeavour in continual motion ; 
Te which is fixed, as an aim or butt, 
Obedience : for so work the honey bees ; 
Creatures that by a rule in nature, teach 
The art of order to a peopled kingdom. 
They have a king, and officers of sorts 
Where some, like magistrates, correct at home ; 
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad j 
Others, like soldiers, armed in their stings, 
Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds; 
Which pillage they witli merry march bring home 



204 HENRY V. 

To the tent-royal of their emperour j 

Who, busied in his majesty, surveys 

The singing mason building roofs of gold, 

The civil citizens kneading up the honey, 

The poor mechanick porters crowding in 

Their heavy burthens at his narrow gate ; 

The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum, 

Delivering o'er to executors pale 

The lazy yawning drone. I this infer, 

That many things, having full reference 

To one consent, may work contrariously : 

As many arrows, loosed several ways, 

Come to one mark ; as many ways meet in one town ; 

As many fresh streams meet in one salt sea ; 

As many lines close in the dial's centre ; 

So may a thousand actions, once a foot. 

End in one purpose, and be all well borne ^ 

Without defeat." 

Henry V. is but one of Shakspeare's second rate 
plays. Yet by quoting passages, like this, from his 
second rate plays alone, we might make a volume 
'' rich with his praise," 

*' As is the oozy botfom of the sea 

With sunken wrack and sumless treasuries." 

Of this sort are the king's remonstrance to Scroop, 
Orey, and Cambridge, on the detection of their trea- 
son, his address to the soldiers at the siege of Har- 
fleur, and the still finer one before the battle of Agin- 
court, the description of the night before the battle, 
and the reflections on ceremony put into the mouth 
of the king. 

"O hard condition ; and twinborn with greatness, 
Subjected to the breath of every fool, 
Whose sense no more can feel but his own wringing ! 
What infinite heart's ease must kings neglect. 
That private men enjoy ? and what have kings, 



HENRY V. 205 

That privates have not too, save ceremony ? 
Save general ceremony ? 
And what art thou, thou idol ceremony ? 
What kind of god art thou, that suflFer'st more 
Of mortal griefs, than do thy worshippers ? 
What are thy rents? what are thy comings in? 

ceremony, shew me but thy worth ! 
What is thy soul, O adoration ? 

Art thou ought else but place, degree, and form, 

Creating awe and fear in other men ? 

Wherein thou art less happy, being feared, 

Than they in fearing. 

What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, 

But poison'd flattery P O, be sick, great greatness, 

And bid thy ceremony give thee cure ! 

Think'st thou, the fiery fever will go out 

With titles blown from adulation ? 

Will it give place to flexure and low bending? 

Can'st thou, when thou comraand'st the beggar's knee, 

Command the health of it ? No, thou proud dream. 

That play'st so subtly with a king's repose, 

1 am a king, that find thee : and I know, 
'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, 
The sword, the mace, tlie crown iiiiperial, 
The enter-tissu'd robe of gold aud pearl. 
The farsed title running 'f jre the kiog. 
The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp 
That beats upon the shore of the world. 
No, not all these, thrice gorgeous ceremony, 
Not all these, laid in bed majestical. 

Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave; 
Who, with a body fill'd, and vacant raiud. 
Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread, 
Never sees horrid night, the child of hell : 
But, like a lacquey, from the rise to set, 
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night 
Sleeps in Elysium; next day, after dawn. 
Doth rise, and help Hyperion to his horse; 
And follows so the everrunuiug year 
With profitable labour, to his grave : 
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch, 
18 



206 HENRY V. 

Wiodiog up days with toil and nights with sleep, 

Has the forehand and vantage of a king. 

The slave, a member of tlie country's peace, 

Enjoys it ; but in gross brain little wots 

What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace, 

Whose hours the peasant best advantages." 

Most of these passages are all well known : there 
is one, which we do not remember to have seen 
noticed, and yet it is no whit inferiour to the rest 
in heroick beauty. It is the account of the deaths 
of York and Suffolk. 

" Exeter. The duke of York commends him to your majesty. 

K. Henry. Lives he, good uncle ? thrice within this hour, 
I saw him down j thrice up again, and fighting; 
From helmet to the spur all blood he was. 

Exeter. In which array (brave soldier) doth he lie, 
Larding the plain : and by his bloody side 
(Yoke-fellow to his honour-owing wounds) 
The noble earl of Suffolk also lies. 
Suffolk first died : and York, all haggled o'er, 
Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteep'd, 
And takes him by the beard ; kisses the gashes, 
That bloodily did yawn upon his face ; 
And cries aloud— Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk 7 
My soul shall thine keep company to heaven : 
Tarry, sneet soul, for mine, thenfly abreast ; 
As, in this glorious and well foughten field, 
We kepi together in our chivalry ! 
Upon these words I came, and cheer'd him up : 
He smil'd me in the face, raught me his hand, 
And, with a feeble gripe, says— Deor, my lord, 
Commend my service to my sovereig^x. 
So did he turn, and over Suffolk's neck 
He threw his wounded arm, and kiss'd his lips; 
And so, espous'd to death, witb blood he seal'd 
A testament of noble-ending love." 

But we must have done with splendid quotations. 
The behaviour of the king, in the difficult and 



HENRY V. 207 

doubtful circumstances in which he is placed, is as 
patient and modest as it is spirited and lofty in his 
prosperous fortune. The character of the French 
nobles is also very admirably depicted; and the 
Dauphin's praise of his horse shews the vanity of 
that class of persons in a very striking point of view. 
Shakspeare always accompanies a foolish prince 
with a satirical courtier, as we see in this instance. 
The comick parts of Henry V. are very inferiour to 
those of Henry IF. Falstaffis dead, and without 
him, Pistol, Nym, and Bardolph, are sateliiles with- 
out a sun. Fluellen the Welchman is the most 
entertaining character in the jiiect-. rie is goon- 
natured, brave, cholerick, and pedantick. His paral- 
lel between Alexander and Harry of Monmouth, 
and his desire to have "some disputations" with 
captain Macmorris on the discipline of the Roman 
wars, in the heat of the battle, are never to be 
forgotten. His treatment of Pistol is as good as 
Pistol's treatment of his French prisoner. There 
are two other remarkable prose passages in this play : 
the conversation of Henry in disguise Avith the three 
sentinels on the duties of a soldier, and his court- 
ship of Katherine in broken French. We like them 
both exceedingly, though the first sfivours perhaps 
too much of the king, and the last too little of the 
lover. 



HENRY VI. 



IN THREE PARTS. 



During the time of the civil wars of York and 
Lancaster, England was a perfect bear-garden, and 
Shakspeare has given us a very lively picture of 
the scene. The three parts of Henry VI. convey a 
picture of very little else : and are inferiour to the 
other historical plays. They have brilliant passages ; 
but the general groundwork is comparatively poor 
and meagre, the style " fiat and unraised." There 
are few lines like the following : — 

" Glory is like a circle in the water ; 
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, 
Till by broad spreading it disperse to nought." 

The first part relates to the wars in France 
after the death of Henry V. and the story of the 
Maid of Orleans. She is here almost as scurvily 
treated as in Voltaire's Pucelle. Talbot is a very 
magnificent sketch : there is something as formidable 
in this portrait of him, as there would be in a 
monumental figure of him, or in the sight of the 



HENRY VI. 209 

armour which he wore. The scene in which he 
visits the Countess of Auvergne, who seeks to 
entrap him, is a very spirited one, and his descrip- 
tion of his own treatment while a prisoner to the 
French not less remarkable. 

" Salisbury. Yet tell'st thou not how thou wert entertain'd, 
Talbot. With scoffs and scorns, and contunaelions taunts, 

In open market-place produced they me, 

To be a publick spectacle to all. 

Here, said they, is the terrour of the French, 

The scarecrow that aflfrights our children so. 

Then broke I from the officers that led nie, 

And with my nails digg'd stones out of the ground 

To hurl at the beholders of my shame. 

My grisly countenance made others fiy, 

None durst come near for fear of sudden death. 

In iron walls they deera'd me not secure : 

So great a fear my name amongst them spread. 

That they supposM I could rend bars of steel. 

And spurn in pieces posts of adamant. 

Wherefore a guard of chosen shot I had : 

They walk'd about nie every minute-while ; 

And if I did but stir out of my bed, 

Ready they were to shoot me to the heart." 

The second part relates chiefly to the contests 
between the nobles during the minority of Henry, 
and the death of Gloucester, the good Duke Hum- 
phrey. The character of Cardinal Beaufort is the 
most prominent in the group : the account of his 
death is one of our author's masterpieces. So is 
the speech of Gloucester to the nobles on the loss 
of the provinces of France by the king's marriage 
with Margaret of Anjou. The pretensions and 
growing ambition of the Duke of York, the father of 
Richard III. are also very ably developed. Among 
18 * 



210 HENRY VI. 

the episodes, the tragicomedy of Jack Cade, and 
the detection of the irapostor Simcox are truly edi- 
fying. 

The third part describes Henry's loss of his 
crown : his death takes place in the last act, which 
is usually thrust into the common acting play of 
Richard III. The character of Gloucester, after- 
wards King Richard, is here very powerfully com- 
menced, and his dangerous designs and long-reach- 
ing ambition are fully described in his soliloquy in 
the third act, beginning, " Aye, Edward will use 
women honourably." Henry VI, is drawn as dis- 
tinctly as his high spirited Queen, and notwith- 
standing the very mean figure which Henry makes 
as a king, we still feel more respect for him than for 
his wife. 

We have already observed that Shakspeare was 
scarcely more remarkable for the force and marked 
contrasts of bis characters, than for the truth and 
subtlety with which he has distinguished those which 
approached the nearest to each other. For instance, 
the soul of Othello is hardly more distinct from that 
of lago, than that of Desdemona is shewn to be 
from ^^milia's ; the am!)ition of Macbeth is as dis- 
tinct from the ambition of Richard III. as it is from 
the meekness of Duncan; the real madness ef Lear 
is as different from the feigned madness of Edgar* 
as from the babbling of the fool : the constrast be- 
tween wit and folly in Falstaff and Shallow is not 
more characteristick though more obvious than the 

* There is another instance of the same distinction in Hamlet and 
Ophelia. Hamlet's pretendt^d madness vouldmake a very good real 
Kiadoess in any other author. 



HENRY VI. 211 

gradations of folly, loquacious or reserved, in Shal- 
low and Silence; and again, the gallantry of Prince 
Henry is as little confounded with that of Hotspur 
as with the cowardice of FalstafiF, or as the sensual 
and philosophick cowardice of the Knight is with the 
pitiful and cringing cowardice of Parolles. All these 
several personages were as different in Shakspeare 
as they would have been in themselves: his imagi- 
nation borrowed from the life, and every circum- 
stance, object, motive, passion, operated there as it 
would in reality, and produced a world of men and 
women as distinct, as true and as various as those 
that exist in nature. The peculiar property of 
Shakspeare's imagiuation was this truth, accompa- 
nied with the unconsciousness of nature ; indeed, 
imagination to be perfect must be unconscious, at 
least in production ; for nature is so. — We shall at- 
tempt one example more in the characters of Richard 
II. and Henry VI. 

The characters and situations of both these per- 
sons were so nearly alike, that they would have 
been completely confounded by a commonplace 
poet. Yet they are kept quite distinct in Shak- 
speare. Both were kings, and both unfortunate. 
Both lost their crowns owing to their mismanage- 
ment and imbecility; the one from a thoughtless, 
wilful abuse of power, the other from an indifference 
to it. The manner in which they bear their mis- 
fortunes corresponds exactly to the causes which 
led to them. The one is always lamenting the 
loss of his power, which he has not the spirit to re- 
gain ; the other seems only to regret that he had 



212 HENRY VI 

ever been king, and is glad to be rid of the power, 
with the trouble; the effeminacy of the one is that 
of a voluptuary, proud, revengeful, impatient of 
contradiction, and inconsolable in his misfortunes ; 
the effeminacy of the other is that of an indolent, 
good-natured mind, naturally averse to the turmoils 
of ambition and the cares of greatness, and who 
wishes to pass his time in monkish indolence and 
contemplation. — Richard bewails the loss of the 
kingly power only as it was the means of gratifj'^ing 
his pride and luxury; Henry regards it only as a 
means of doing right, and is less desirous of the ad- 
vantages to be derived from possessing it than 
afraid of exercising it wrong. In knighting a young 
soldier, he gives him ghostly advice — 

" Edward Plantagenet, arise a knight, 

And learn this lesson, draw thy sword in right." 

Richard li. in the first speeches of the play be- 
trays his real character. In the first alarm of his 
pride, on hearing of Bolingbroke's rebellion, before 
his presumption has met with any check, he ex- 
claims — 

" Mock not ray senseless conjuration, lords : 
This earth shall have a feeling, and these stones 
Prove armed soldiers, ere her native king 
Shall faulter under proud rebellious arms. 

Not all the water in the rough rude sea 

Can wash the balm from an anointed king ; 

The breath of worldly man cannot depose 

The Deputy elected by the Lord. 

For every man that Bolingbroke hath prest, __ 

To lift sharp steel against our golden crown, 

Heaven for his Richard hath in heavenly pay 



HENRY VI. 213 

A glorious angel ; then if angels fight, 

Weak men must fall j for Heaven still guards the right." 

Yet, notwithstanding this royal confession of faith, 
on the very first news of actual disaster, all his con- 
ceit of himself as the peculiar favourite of Provi- 
dence vanishes into air. 

" But now the blood of twenty thousand men 
Did triumph in my face, and they are fled. 
All souls that will be safe fly from my side; 
For time hath set a blot upon my pride." 

Immediately after, however, recollecting that 
" cheap defence" of the divinity of kings which is to 
he found in opinion, he is for arming his name against 
his enemies. 

'* Awake, thoa coward Majesty, thou sleep'st j 
Is not the King's name forty thousand names ? 
Arm, arm, my name : a puny subject strikes 

At thy great glory." 

King Henry does not make any such vapouring 
resistance to the loss of his crown, but lets it slip 
from off his head as a weight which he is neither 
able nor willing to bear; stands quietly by to see the 
issue of the contest for his kingdom, as if it were a 
game at push-pin, and is pleased when the odds prove 
against him. 

When Richard first hears of the death of his 
favourites. Bushy, Bagot, and the rest, he indignant- 
ly rejects all idea of any further efforts, and only 
indulges in the extravagant impatience of his grief 
and his despair, in that fine speech which has been 
so often quoted : — 



214 HENRY VI. 

*^Aumerle. Where is the duke, my father, with his power* 
K. Richard. No matter where : of comfort no man speak : 

Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs, 

Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes 

Write sorrow in the bosom of the earth ! 

Let's cause executors, and talk of wills : 

And yet not so — for what can we bequeath, 

Save our deposed bodies to the ground? 

Our lands, our lives, and all are Bolingbroke's, 

And nothing can we call our own, but death, 

And that small model of the barren earth, 

Which serves as paste and cover to oih- bones. 

For heaven's sake let us sit upon the ground, 

And tell sad stories of the death of Kings : 

How some have been depos'd, some slain in war j 

Some haunted by the ghosts they dispossess'd ; 

Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping kill'd i 

Ail murder'd : — for within the hollow crown. 

That rounds the mortal temples of a king, 

Keeps death his court : and there the antick sits, 

Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp ! 

Allowing him a breath, a little scene 

To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks 

Infusing him with self and vain conceit — 

As if this flesh, which walls about our life. 

Were brass impregnable ; and, humour'd thus, 

Comes at the last, and, with a little pin, 

Bores through his castle wall, and— farewell king I 

Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood 

With solemn reverence; throw away respect, 

Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty, 

For you have but mistook me all this while : 

I live on bread like ycu, feel want, taste grief, 

Need friends, like you ;— subjected thus, 

How can you say to me — I am a king p" 

There is as little sincerity afterwards in his al- 
fected resignation to his fate, as there is fortitude in 
this exaggerated picture of his misfortunes before 
they have happened. 



HENRY VI. 215 

When Northumberland comes back with the mes- 
sage from Bolingbroke, he exclaims, anticipating the 
result,— *^ 

" What must the king do now ? Must he submit? 
The king shall do it : must he be depos'd ? 
The king shall be contented : must he lose 
The name of king? O' God's name let it go. 
I'll give my jewels for a set of beads ; 
My gorgeous palace for a hermitage; 
My gay apparel for an alms-man's gown ; 
My figur'd goblets for a dish of wood ; 
My sceptre for a palmer's walking staff; 
My subjects for a pair of carved saints,' 
And my large kingdom for a little grave— 
A little, little grave, an obscure grave." 

How differently is all this expressed in King Hen- 
ry's soliloquy during the battle with Edward's 
party :— 

" This battle fares like to the morning's war, 
When dying clouds contend with growing light, 
What time the shepherd blowing of his nails. 
Can neither call it perfect day or night. 
Here on this mole hill will 1 sit me down ; 
To whom God will, there be the victory ! 
For Margaret my Queen and Clifford too 
Have chid me from the battle, swearing both 
They prosper best of all whence I am thence. 
Would I were dead, if God's good will were so. 
For what is in this world but grief and wo ? 
O God ! methinks it were a happy life 
'Jo be no better than a homely swain, 
To sit upon a hill as I do now. 
To carve out dials quaintly, point by point. 
Thereby to see the minutes how they run : 
How many make the hour full complete, 
How many hours bring about the day. 
How many days will finish up the year, 
How many years a mortal man may live. 
When this is known, then to divide the times .- 



216 HENRY VI. 

So many hours must I tend my flock, 

So many hours must I take my rest, 

So many hours must I contemplate, 

So many hours must I sport myself; 

So many days my ewes have been with young, 

So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean, 

So many months ere I shall shear the fleece: 

So many minutes, hours, weeks, months, and years 

Past over, to the end they were created. 

Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. 

Ah ! what a life were this ! how sweet, how lovely ! 

Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade 

To shepherds looking on their silly sheep, 

Than doth a rich embroidered canopy 

To kings that fear their subjects' treachery? 

O yes it doth, a thousand fold it doth. 

And to conclude, the shepherd's homely curds, » 

His cold ttiin drink out of his leather bottle, 

His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade, 

All which secure and sweetly he enjoys, 

Is far beyond a prince's delicates. 

His viands sparkling in a golden cup. 

His body couched in a curious bed. 

When care, mistrust, and treasons wait on him." 

This is a true and beautiful description of a na- 
turally quiet^and contented disposition, and not, like 
the former, the spienetick efifusion of disappointed 
ambition. 

In the last scene of Richard II. his despair lends 
him courage : he beats the keeper, slays two of his 
assassins, and dies with imprecations in his mouth 
against Sir Pierce Exton, who " had staggered his 
royal person." Henry, when he is seized by the 
deer-stealers, only reads them a moral lecture on the 
duty of allegiance and the sancli{y of an oath; and 
when stabbed by Gloucester in the Tower, reproach- 
es him with his crimes, but pardons him his own 
death. 



RICHARD III. 



Richard III. may be considered as properly a stage 
play ; it belongs to the theatre, rather than to the 
closet. We shall therefore criticise it chietJy with a 
reference to the manner in which we have seen it 
performed. It is the character in which Garrick 
came out : it was the second character in which Mr. 
Kean appeared, and in which he acquired his fame. 
Shakspeare we have always with us: actors we 
have only for a few seasons; and therefore some ac- 
count of them may be acceptable, if not to our con- 
temporaries, to those who come after us, if " that 
rich and idle personage, Posterity," should deign to 
look into our writings. 

It is possible to form a higher conception of the 
character of Richard than that given by Blr. Kean : 
but we cannot imagine any character represented 
with greater distinctness and precision, more per- 
fectly articulated in every part. Perhaps indeed 
there is too much of what is technically called exe- 
cution. When we first saw this celebrated actor in 
the part, we thought he sometimes failed from an 
19 



218 RICHARD III. 

exuberance of manner, and dissipated the impression 
of the general character by tlie variety of his re- 
sources. To be complete, his delineation of it 
should have more solidity, depths, sustained and im- 
passioned feeling, with somewhat less brilliancy, with 
fewer glancing lights, pointed transitions, and panto- 
mimick evolutions. 

The Richard of Shakspeare is towering and lofty ; 
equally impetuous and commanding ; haughty, vio- 
lent, and subtle ; bold and treacherous ; confi- 
dent in his strength as well as his cunning ; raised 
high by his birth, and higher by his talents and his 
crimes ; a royal usurper, a princely hypocrite, a 
tyrant and a murderer of the house of Plantageuet. 

" But I was born so high : 

Our aery buildeth in the cedar's top, 

And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun." 

The idea conveyed in these lines (which are indeed 
omitted in the miserable medley acted for Richard 
III.) is never lost sight of by Shakspeare, and 
should not be out of the actor's mind for a moment. 
The restless and sanguinary Richard is not a man 
striving to be great, but to be greater than he is ; 
conscious of his strength of will, his power of 
intellect, his daring courage, his elevated station ; 
and making use of these advantages to commit 
unheard of crimes, and to shield himself from remorse 
and infamy. 

If Mr. Kean does not entirely succeed in con- 
centrating all the lines of the character, as drawn 
by Shakspeare, he gives an animation, vigour, and 
relief to the part which we have not seen equal- 
led. He is more refined than Cooke ; more bold. 



RICHARD III. 219 

varied, and original than Kemble in the same 
character. In some parts he is deficient in digni- 
ty, and particularly in the scenes of state business, 
he has by no means an air of artificial authority. 
There is at times an aspiring elevation, an enthu- 
siastick rapture in his expectations of attaining 
the crown, and at others a gloating expression of 
sullen delight, as if he already clenched the bau- 
ble, and held it in his grasp. The courtship scene 
with Lady Anne is an admirable exhibition of 
smooth and smiling villauy. The progress of wily 
adulation, of encroaching humility, is finely marked 
by his action, voice and eye. He seems, like the 
first tempter, to approach his prey, secure of the 
event, and as if success ha^ smoothed his way 
before him. The late Mr. Cooke's manner of re- 
presenting this scene was more vehement, hurried, 
and full of anxious uncertainty. This, though more 
natural in general, was less in character in this par- 
ticular instance. Richard should woo less as a 
lover than as an actor — to shew his mental su- 
periority, and power of making others the play- 
things of his purposes. Mr. Kean's attitude in lean- 
ing against the side of the stage before he comes 
forward to address Lady Anne, is one of the most 
graceful and striking ever witnessed on the stage. 
It would do for Titian to paint. The frequent and 
rapid transition of his voice from the expression of 
the fiercest passion to the most familiar tones of 
conversation, was that which gave a peculiar grace 
of novelty to his acting on his first appearance. 
This has been since imitated and caricatured by 
others, and he himself uses the artifice more sparing" 



220 RICHARD III. 

ly than he did. His by-play is excellent. His 
manner of bidding his friends " Good night," after 
pausing with the point of his sword, drawn slowly 
backward and forward on the ground, as if consider- 
ing the^tplanof the battle next day, is a particularly 
happy and "natural thought. He gives to the two 
last acts of the play the greatest animation and 
effect. He tills every part of the stage ; and makes 
up for the deficiency of his person, by what has been 
sometimes objected to as an excess of action. The 
concluding scene in which he is killed by Richmond 
is the most brilliant of the whole. He fights at last 
like one drunk with wounds ; and the attitude in 
which he stands with his hands stretched out, after 
his sword is wrested from him, has a preternatural 
and terrifick grandeur, as if his will could not be 
disarmed, and the very phantoms of his despair had 
power to kill. — Mr. Kean has since, in a great mea- 
sure, effaced the impression of his Richard III. by 
the superiour efforts of his genius in Othello, (his 
masterpiece,) in the murder scene in Macbeth, in 
Richard II., in Sir Giles Overreach, and lastly in 
Oroonoko; but we still like to look back to his 
first performance of this part, both because it first 
assured his admirers of his future success, and be- 
cause we bore our feeble but, at that time, not use- 
less testimony, to the merits of this very original 
actor, on which the town was considerably di- 
vided for no other reason than because they were 
original. 

The manner in which Shakspeare's plays have 
been generally altered, or rather mangled by mo- 
dern mechanists, is a disgrace to the English stage, 



RICHARD III. 1*-^! 

The patchwork Richard III., which is acted un- 
der the sanction of his name, and which was manu- 
factured by Gibber, is a striking example of this 
remark. 

The play itself is undoubtedly a very powerful 
eflfusion of Shakspeare's genius. The groundwork 
of the character of Richard, that mixture of intel- 
lectual vigour with moral depravity, in which Shak- 
speare delighted to shew his strength — gave full 
scope as well as temptation to the exercise of his 
imagination. The character of his hero is almost 
every where predominant, and marks its lurid track 
throughout. The original play is however too long 
for representation, and there are sonae few scenes 
which might be better spared than preserved, and 
by omitting which it would remain a complete 
whole. The only rule, indeed, for altering Shak- 
speare is to retrench certain passages which may 
be considered either as superfluous or obsolete, but 
not <o add or transpose any thing. The arrange- 
ment and developement of the story, and the mutual 
contrast and combination of the dramatis persons, 
are in general as finely managed as the develope- 
ment of the characters or the expression of the pas- 
sions. 

This rule has not been adhered to in the pre- 
sent instance. Some of the most important and 
striking passages in the principal character have 
been omitted, to make room for idle and misplaced 
extracts from other plays ; the only intention of 
which seems to have been to make the character of 
Richard as odious and disgusting as possible. It 
is apparently for no other purpose than to make 
19 * 



222 RICHARD 111. 

Gloucester stab King Henry on the stage, that the 
fine abrupt introduction of the character in the 
opening of the play is lost in the tedious whining 
morality of the uxorious liing (taken from another 
play); — we say tedious, because it interrupts the 
business of the scene, and loses its beauty and 
effect by having no intelligible connexion with the 
previous character of the mild, well-meaning mo- 
narch. The passages which the unfortunate Henry 
has to recite are beautiful and pathetick in them- 
selves, but they have nothing to do with the world 
that Richard has to •' bustle in." In the same spirit 
of vulgar caricature is the scene between Richard 
and Lady Anne (when his wife) interpolated with- 
out any authority, merely to gratify this favourite 
propensity to disgust and loathing. With the same 
perverse consistency, Richard, after his last fatal 
struggle, is raised up by some Galvanick process, 
to utter the imprecation, without any motive but 
pure malignity, which Shakspeare has so properly 
put into the mouth of Northumberland on hearing 
of Percy's death. To make room for these worse 
than needless additions, many of the most striking 
passages in the real play have been omitled by the 
foppery and ignorance of the prompt-book criticks. 
We do not mean to insist merely on passages which 
are fine as poetry and to the reader, such as Cla- 
rence's dream, &c. but on those which are impor- 
tant to the understanding of the character, and 
peculiarly ada[)ted for stage effect. We Avill give 
the following as instances among several others. 
The first is the scene where Richard enters abrupt- 



■•'%* 



RICHARD III. 22a 

ly to the queeo and her friends to defend him- 
self:— 

" Gloucester. They do nie wrong, and I will not endure it. 
Who are they that complain unto the king, 
That I forsooth am stern, and love them not ? 
By holy Paul, they love his grace but lightly, 
That fill his ears with such dissentious rumours : 
Because I cannot flatter and look fair, 
Smile in men's faces, smooth, deceive, and cog, 
Duck with French nods, and apish courtesy, 
I must be held a rancorous enemy. 
Cannot a plain man Jive, and think no harm, 
But thus his simple truth must be abus'd 
With silken, sly, insinuating Jacks .3 

Gray. To whom in all this presence speaks your grace ? 

Gloucester. To thee, that hast nor lionesty nor grace ; 
When have I injur'd thee, when done thee wrong p 
Or thee ? or thee ? or any of your faction ? 
A plague upon you all !" 

Nothing can be more characteristick than the tur 
bulent pretensions to meekness and simplicity in 
this address. Again, the versatility and adroitness 
of Richard is admirably described in the following 
ironical conversation wilh Brakenbury : 

" Brakenbury. I beseech your graces both to pardon me. 
His majesty hath straitly given in charge. 
That no man shall have private conference, 
Of what degree soever, with your brother. 

Gloucester. E'en .so, and please your worship, Brakenbury, 
You may partake of any thing we say : 
We speak no treason, man —we say the king 
Is wise and virtuous, and his nuble qneen 
Well strook in years, fair, and not jealous. 
We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot, 
A cherry lip, a passing pleasing tongue ; 
That the queen's kindred are made gentlefolks. 
How say you, sir ? Can you deny all this ? 



224 RICHARD III. 

Brakenbury. With this, my lord, myself have nought to do. 

Gloucester.^ What, fellow, naught to do with mistress Shore? 
I tell you, sir, he that doth naught with her, 
Excepting one, were best to do it secretly alone. 

Brakenbury. What one, my lord ? 

Gloucester. Her husband, knave — would'st thou betray me ?" 

The feigned reconciliation of Gloucester with 
the queen's kinsmen is also a masterpiece. One 
of the finest strokes in the play, and which serves 
to shew as much as any thing, the deep, plausible 
manners of Richard, is the unsuspecting security of 
Hastings, at the very time when the former is plot- 
ting his death, and when that very appearance of 
cordiality and good humour, on which Hastings 
builds his confidence, arises from Richard's conscious- 
ness of having betrayed him to his ruin. This, 
with the whole character of Hastings, is omitted. 

Perhaps the two most beautiful passages in the 
original play are the farewell apostrophe of the 
queen to the tower, where her children are shut up 
from her, and Tyrrei's description of their death. 
We will finish our quotations with them. 

" Queen. Stay, yet look back with me unto the Tower ; 
Pity, you ancient stones, those tender babes. 
Whom envy hath iiuniured within your walls ; 
Rough cradle for such little pretty ones. 
Rude, rugged nurse, old sullen playfellow, 
For tender princes !" 

The other passage is the account of their death by 
Tyrrel :— 

" Dightdn and Forrest, whom I did suborn 
To do this* piece of ruthless butchery, 
Albeit they were flesh 'd villains, bloody dogs. 
Wept like to children in their death's sad story : 



RICHARD III. 225 

O thus ! queth Dighton, lay the gentle babes ; 

Thus, thus, quoth Forrest, girdling one another 

Within their innocent alabaster arms j 

Their lips were four red roses on a stalk, 

And in that suranier beauty kissed each other ; 

A book of prayers on their pillow lay, 

Which once, quoth Forrest, almost changed my mind : 

But oh the devil ! — there the villain stopped ; 

When Dighton thus told on — we smothered 

The most replenished sweet work of nature, 

That from the prime creation ere she framed." 

These are some of those wonderful bursts of feel- 
ing, done to the life, to the very height of fancy and 
nature, which oar Shakspeare alone could give We 
do not insist on the repetition of these last passages 
as proper for the stage : we should indeed be loth to 
trust them in the mouth of almost any actor: but we 
should wish them to be retained in preference at 
least to the fantoccini exhibition of the young prin- 
ces, Edward and York, bandying childish wit with 

their uncle, 

r 



HENRY VIII. 



This play contains little action or violence of pas- 
sion, yet it has considerable interest of a more 
mild and thoughtful cast, and some of the most strik- 
ing passages in the author's works. The character 
of Queen Katherine is the most perfect delineation 
of matronly dignity, sweetness, and resignation, that 
can be conceived. Her appeals to the protection of 
the king, her remonstrances to the cardinals, her 
conversations with her women, shew a noble and ge- 
nerous spirit accompanied with the utmost gentle- 
ness of nature. What can be more affecting than 
her answer to Campeius and Wolsey, who come to 
visit her as pretended friends. 



" Nay, forsooth, my friends, 



Tliey that my trust must grow to, live not here ; 
They are, as all my comforts are, far hence, 
hi mine own country, lords." 

Dr. Johnson observes of this play, that " the meek 
sorrows and virtuous distress of Katherine have fur- 
nished some scenes, which may be justly numbered 
among the greatest efforts of tragedy. But the ge- 
nius of Shakspeare comes in and goes out with Kathe- 
ri ne. Every other part may be easily conceived 



HENRY VIII. 227 

and easily written." This is *easily said; but with 
all due deference to so great a reputed authority 
as that of Johnson, it is not true. For instance, the 
scene of Buckingham led to execution is one of the 
most affecting and natural in Shakspeare, and one to 
which there is hardly an approach in any other au- 
thor. Again, the character of Wolsey, the description 
of his pride and of his fall, are inimitable, and have, 
besides their gorgeousness of effect, a pathos, which 
only the genius of Shakspeare could lend to the dis- 
tresses of a proud, bad man, like Wolsey. There is 
a sort of child-like simplicity in Ihe very helpless- 
ness of his situation, arising from the recollection of 
his past overbearing ambition. After the cutting 
sarcasms of his enemies on his disgrace, against 
which he bears up with a spirit conscious of his own 
superiority, he breaks out into that fine apostrophe— 

'' Farewell, a long farewell, to all ray greatness ! 
This is the state of man ; to-day he puts forth 
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms, 
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him ; 
The third day, comes a frost, a killing frost j 
And— when he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
His greatness is a ripening— nips his root, 
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventur'd, 
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, 
These many summers in a sea of glory ; 
But far beyond by depth : my high-blown pride 
At length broke under me ; and now has left me, 
Weary and old with service, to the mercy 
Of a rode stream, that must forever hide me. 
Vain pomp and glory of the world, I hate ye ! 
I feel ray heart new open'd : O how wretched 
Is that poor man, that hangs on princps' favours ! 
There is betwixt that smile he would aspire to, 
That sweet aspect of princes, and his ruin, 



228 HENRY VIII. 

More pangs and fears than war aad women have ; 
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, 
Never to hope again !" — 

There is in this passage, as well as in the well 
knoAvn dialogue with Cromwell which follows, some- 
thing which stretches beyond commonplace ; nor is 
the account which Griffiths gives of Wolsey's death 
less Shakspearian ; and the candour with which 
Queen Katherine listens to the praise of " him whom 
of all men while living she hated most," adds the last 
graceful finishing to her character. 

Among other images of great individual beauty, 
might be mentioned the description of the effect of 
Ann Boleyn's presenting herself to the crowd at her 
coronation. 

————*' While her grace sat down 



To rest a awhile, some half an hour or so, 
In a rich chair of state, opposing freely 
The beauty of her person to the people. 
Believe me, sir, she is the goodliest woman 
That ever lay by man. Which when the people 
Had the full view of, such a noise arose 
As the shrouds make at sea in a stiff tempest, 
Js loud and to asmany /wnes." 

The character of Henry VIII. is drawn with great 
truth and spirit. It is like a very disagreeable portrait, 
sketched by the hand of a master. His gross ap- 
pearance, his blustering demeanour, his vulgarity, 
his arrogance, his sensuaiily, his cruelty, his hypo- 
crisy, his want of common decency and common hu- 
manity, are marked in strong lines. His tradition- 
al j)eculiarities of expression complete the reality of 
the picture. The authoritative expletive, " Ha !" 
with which he intimates his indignation or surprise, 



HENRY VIII. 229 

bas an effect like the first startling sound that breaks 
from a thunder-cloud. He is of all the monarchs in 
our history the most disgusting : for he unites in him- 
self all the vices of barbarism and refinement, with- 
out their virtues. Other kings before him (such as 
Richard III.) were tyrants and murderers out of 
ambition or necessity: they gained or established 
unjust power by violent means: they destroyed their 
enemies, or those who barred their access to the 
throne or made its tenure insecure. But Henry 
VIII.'s power is most fatal to those whom he loves : 
he is cruel and remorseless to pamper his luxurious 
appetites: bloody and voluptuous: an amorous mur- 
derer; an uxorious debauchee. His hardened in- 
sensibility to the feelings of others is strengthened 
by the most profligate self-indulgence. The reli- 
gious hypocrisy, under which he masks his cruelty 
and his lust, is admirably displayed in the speech in 
which he describes the first misgivings of his con- 
science and its increasing throes and terrours, which 
have induced him to divorce his queen. The only 
thing in his favour in this play is his treatment of 
Cranmer: there is also another circumstance in his 
favour, which is his patronage of Hans Holbein.— 
It has been said of Shakspeare— " No maid could 
live near such a man." It might with as good rea- 
son be said— "No king could live near such a man.'» 
His eye would have penetrated through the pomp 
of circumstance and the veil of opinion. As it is 
he has represented such persons to the life — his 
plays are in this respect the glass of history— he 
has done them the same justice as if he had been 
a privy counsellor all his life, and in each succes- 
20 



230 



HENRY VIII. 



sive reign. Kings ought never to be seen upon the 
stage. In the abstract, they are very disagreeable 
characters : it is only while living that they are " the 
best of kings." It is their power, their splendour, 
it is the apprehension of the personal consequen- 
ces of their favour or their hatred, that dazzles the 
imagination and suspends the judgment of their fa- 
vourites or their vassals ; but death cancels the bond 
of allegiance and of interest ; and seen as they were, 
their power and their pretensions look monstrous and 
ridiculous. The charge brought against modern 
philosophy as inimical to loyalty is unjust, because it 
might as well be brought against other things. No 
reader of history can be a lover of kings. We have 
often wondered that Henry VIII. as he is drawn by 
Shakspeare, and as we have seen him represented in 
all the bloated deformity of mind and person, is not 
hooted from the English stage. 



KING JOHN. 



K.ING John is the last of the historical plays we shall 
have to speak of; and we are not sorry that it is. If 
we are to indulge ourimaginations, we had rather do it 
upon an imaginary theme ; if we are to find subjects for 
the exercise of our pity and terrour, we prefer seeking 
them in fictitious danger and fictitious distress. It 
gives a soreness to our feelingsof indignation or sympa- 
thy, when we know that in tracing the progress of suf- 
ferings and crimes, we are treading upon real ground, 
and recollect that the poet's " dream" denoted a fore- 
gone conclusion — irrevocable ills, not conjured up 
by fancy, but placed beyond the reach of poetical 
justice. That the treachery of King John, the 
death of Arthur, the grief of Constance, had a real 
truth in history, sharpens the sense of pain, while it 
hangs a leaden weight on the heart and the imagina- 
tion. Something whispers us that we have no right 
to make a mock of calamities like these, or to turn 
the truth of things into the puppet and plaything 
of our fancies. " To consider thus" may be " to 
consider too curiously ;" but still we think that the 



•^32 KING JOHN. 

actual truth of the particular events, in proportion 
as we are conscious of it, is a drawback on the 
pleasure as well as the dignity of tragedy. 

King John has all the beauties of language and 
all the richness of the imagination to relieve the 
paiufulness of the subject. The character of King 
John himself is kept pretty much in the back-ground ; 
it is only marked in by comparatively slight indi- 
cations. The crimes he is tempted to commit are 
juch as are thrust upon him rather by circumstan- 
ces and opportunity than of his own seeking : he is 
here represented as more cowardly than cruel, and 
as more contemptible than odious. The play em- 
braces only a part of his history. There are how- 
ever few characters on the stage that excite more 
disgust and loathing. He has no intellectual gran- 
deur or strength of character to shield him from the 
indignation which his immediate conduct provokes : 
he stands naked and defenceless, in that respect, to 
the worst we can think of him : and besides, we are 
impelled to put the very w^orst construction on his 
meanness and cruelty by the tender picture of the 
beauty and helplessness of the object of it, as well 
as by the frantick and heart rending pleadings of 
maternal despair. We do not forgive him the death 
of Arthur because he had too late revoked his doom 
and tried to prevent it, and perhaps because he has 
himself repented of his black design, our moral 
sense gains courage to hate him the more for it. We 
take him at his word, and think his purposes must be 
odious indeed, when he himself shrinks back from 
them. The scene in which King John suggests to 
Hubert the design of murdering his nephew is a 



KING JOHN. 233 

masterpiece of dramatick skill, but it is still infe- 
riour, very inferiour to the scene between Hubert 
and Arthur, when the latter learns the orders to put 
out his eyes. If any thing ever was penned, heart- 
piercing, mixing the extremes of terrour and pity 
of that which shocks and that which soothes the 
mind, it it this scene. We will give it entire, though 
perhaps it is tasking the reader's sympathy too 
much. 

'* Enter Hubert and Executioner. 

Hubert. Heat me these irons hot, and look you stand 
Within the arras j when I strike my foot 
Upon the bosom of the ground, rush forth 
And bind the boy, which you shall find with me, 
Fast to the chair : be heedful : hence, and watch. 

Executioner. I hope your warrant will bear out the deed. 

Hubert. Uncleanly scruples ! fear not you ; look to't.— 
Youn^ lad, come forth ; I have to say with you. 

Enter Arthur. 

Jrfhur. Good morrow, Hubert. 

Hubert. Good morrow, little Prince. 

Arthur. A s little prince (having so great a title 
To be more prince) as may be. You are sad. 

Hubert. Indeed I have been merrier. 

Arthur. Mercy on me ! 
Methinks no body should be sad but I ; 
Yet I remember when I was in Prance, 
Young gentlemen would be as sad as night, 
Only for wantonness. By my Christendom, 
So wf re I out of prison, and kept sheep, 
I should he merry as the day is long. 
And ^o I would be here, but that I doubt 
My uncfe practises more harm to me. 
He is afraid of me, and I of him. 
Is it my fault that I was GeoSTry's son." 
Indeed it U not, and I would to heav'n 
I were your son, so you would love me, Hubert. 
20 * 



234 KING JOHN. 

Hubert. If I talk to him, with his innocent prate 
He will awake wy mercy, which lies dead •j 
Therefore I will be sudden, and despatch. [Jsidt 

Jrthur. Are you sick, Hubert ? you look pale to-day ? 
In sooth, I would you were a little sick, 
That I might sit all night and watch with you. 
Alas, I love you more than you do me. 

Hubert. His words do take possession of my bosom. 
Read here, young Arthur — [Shening a paper. 

How now, foolish rheum, [Asidt. 

Turning dis-piteous torture out of door .•■ 
I must be brief, lest resolution drop 
Out at mine eyes in tender womanish tears. — 
Can you not read it ? Is it not fair writ ? 

Arthur. Too fairly, Hubert, for so foul effect. 
Must you with irons burn out both mine eyes.^ 

Hubert. Young boy, I must. 

Arthur. And will you ? 

Hubert. And I will. 

Arthur. Have you the heart ? W hen your head did but ache, 
I knit my handkerchief about your brows, 
!_The best I had, a princess wrought it me) 
And I did never ask it you again ; 
And with my hand at midnight held your headj 
And, like the watchful mini>tes to the hour, 
Still and anon chear'd up the heavy time. 
Saying, what lack you ? and where lies your grief .9 
Or, what good love may I perform for you P 
Many a poor man's son would have lain still, 
And ne'er have spoke a loving word to you ; 
But you at your sick service had a prince, 
Pf ay, you may think my love was crafty love, 
x\nd call it cunning. Do, and if you will: 
If heav'n be pleas'd that you must use me ill, 

Why then you must. Will you put out mine eyes i* 

These eyes, that never did, and never shall, 
So much as frown on you ? 

Hubert. I've sworn to do it ; 
And with hot irons must 1 burn them oat. 

Arthur. Oh if an iangel should have come to mq, 
And told me Hubert should put out mine eyes, 
i would not have believ'd a tongue but Hubert'&> 



KING JOHN. :iti5 

Hubert. Come forth j do as I bid you. 

[Stamps, and the men enter, 
Arthur. () save me, Hubert, save ine ! my eyes are out 
Ev^n with the fierce looks of these bloody men. 
Hubert. Give me the iron, I say, and bind him here. 
Arthur. Alas, what need you be so boist'rous rough ? 
I will not struggle, I will stand stone still. 
For heav'n's sake, Hubert, let me not be bound. 
Nay, hear me, Hubert, drive these men away^ 
AJid 1 will sit as quiet as a lamb. 

I will not stir, nor wince, nor speak a word, ^ 

Nor look upon the iron angrily : 
Thrust but these men away, and I'll forgive you, 
Whatever torment you do put me to. 

Hubert. Go, stand witliin ; let me alone with him. 
Executioner. I am best pleas'd to be from such a deed. 

[Exit. 
Arthur. Alas, I then have chid away my friend. 
He hath a stern look, but a gentle heart; 
Let him come back, that his compassion may 
Give life to yours. 
Hubert. Come, boy, prepare yourself. 
Arthur. Is there no remedy ? 
Hubert. None, but to lose your eyes. 
Arthur. O heav'n ! that there were but a moth in yours, 
A grain, a dust, a gnat, a waud'ring hair, 
Any annoyance in that precious sense : 
Then feeling what pmall things are boist'rous there, 
Your vile intent must need^ seem horrible. 

Hubert. Is this your promise ? go to, hold your tongue. 
Arthur. Let me not hold my toiigue ; let me not, Hubert ^ 
Or, Hubert, if you will, cut out my tongue. 
So I rcfay keep mine eyes. (> spare mine eyes ! 
Though to no use, but still to look on you. 
Lo, by my troth, the instrument is cold, 
And would not harm me. 
Hubert. I can heat it, boy. 

Arthur. No, in good sooth, the fire is dead with grief. 
Being create for comfort, to be us*d 
In undeserv'd extremes ; see else yourself, 
There is no malice in this buroing coal ; 



236 KING JOHN. 

\ 
The breath of heav'n hath blown its spirit out, 

And strew'd repentant ashes on its head. 

Hubert. But with ray breath I can revive it, boy. 

Arthur. AH things that you should use to do me wrong. 
Deny their office ; ouly you do lack 
That mercy which fierce fire and iron extend, 
Creatures of note for mercy-lacking uses. 

Hubert. Well, see to live; I will not touch thine eyes 
For all the treasure that thine uncle owns : 
Yet I am sworn, and 1 did purpose, boy, 
With this same very iron to burn them out. 

Arthur. O, now you look like Hubert. All this while 
You were disguised. 

Hubert. Peace no more. Adieu, 
Your uncle must not know but you are dead. 
I'll fill these dogged spies with false reports : 
And, pretty child, sleep doubtless and secure. 
That Hubert, for the wealth of all the world, 
Will not offend thee. 

Arthur. O heav'n ! I thank you, Hubert. 

Hubert. Silence, no more ; go closely in with me ; 
Much danger do 1 undergo for thee. [Exeunt.'''* 

His death afterwards, when he throws himself 
from his prison-walls, excites the utmost pity for 
his innocence and friendless situation, and well 
justifies the exaggerated denunciations of Falcon- 
bridge to Hubert whom he suspects wrongfully of the 
deed. 

" There is not yet so ugly a fiend of hell 
As thou shall be, if thou didst kill this child. 
— If thou diilst but consent 
To this njost cruel act, do but despair: 
And if tljou want'st a cord, the smallest thread 
That ever spider twistc^d from her womb 
Wi'si straui?ie thee ; a rush vriil be a beam 
To haiip '.hee on : or would'st thou drown thyself. 
Put but a little w Uer in a spoon, 
And it ^hali be as all the ocean, 
Enough to stifle such a villain up." 



KING JOHN. 237 

The excess of maternal tenderness, rendered 
desperate by the fickleness of friends and the in- 
justice of fortune, and made stronger in will, in 
proportion to the want of all other power, was never 
more finely expressed than in Constance. The 
dignity of her answer to King Philip, when she 
refuses to accompany his messenger, " To me and 
to the state of my great grief, let kings assemble," 
her indignant reproach to Austria for deserting her 
cause, her invocation to death, " that love of 
misery," however fine and spirited, all yield to the 
beauty of the passage, where, her passion subsiding 
into tenderness, she addresses the Cardinal in these 
words : — 

" Oh father Cardinal, I have heard you say 
That we shall see and know our friends in heav'n : 
If that be, I shall see my boy again, 
For since the birth of Cain, the first male child, 
To him that did but yesterday suspire, 
There was not such a gracious creature born. 
But now will canker-sorrow eat my bud, 
And chase the native beauty from his cheek. 
And he will look as hollow as a ghost, 
As dim and meagre as an ague's fit, 
And so he'll die ; and rising so again, 
When I shall meet him in the court of heav'n, 
I shall not know him ; therefore never, never' 
Must I behold my pretty Arthur more. 

K. Philip. You are as fond of grief as of your child. 

Constance. Grief fills the room up of my absent child : 
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me ; 
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words, ^ 

Remembers me of all his gracious parts ; 
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form. 
Then have I reason to be fond cf grief." 

The contrast between the mild resignation of Queen 
Katharine to her own wrongs, and the wild, uucon- 



238 KING JOHN. 

trolable affliction of Constance for the wrongs which 
she sustains as a mother, is no less naturally con- 
ceived than it is ably sustained throughout these 
two wonderful characters. 

The accompaniment of the comick character of 
the Bastard was well chosen to relieve the piognant 
agony of suffering, and the cold, cowardly policy of 
behaviour in the principal characters of this play. 
Its spirit, invention, volubility of tongue, and for- 
wardness in action, are unbounded. Aliquando 
siffflaminandus eraU says Ben Jonson of Shakspeare. 
But we should be sorry if Ben Jonson had been his 
licenser. We prefer the heedless magnanimity of 
his wit infinitely to ail Jonson's laborious caution. 
The character of the Bastard's comick humour is the 
same in essence as that of other comick charac- 
ters in Shakspeare ; they always run on with good 
things and are never exhausted; they are always 
daring and successful. They have words at will 
and a flow of wit, like a flow of animal spirits. The 
difl'erence between Falconbridge and the others is 
that he is a soldier, and brings his wit to bear upon 
action, is courageous with his sword as well as tongue, 
and stimulates his gallantry by his jokes, his ene- 
mies feeling the sharpness of his blows and the sting 
of his sarcasms at the same time. Among his hap- 
piest sallies are his descanting on the composition 
of his own person, his invective against "commo- 
dity, tickling commodity," and his expression of 
contempt for the Archduke of Austria, who had 
killed his father, which begins in jest but ends in 
serious earnest. His conduct at the siege of An- 
giers shews that his resources were not confined to 



KING JOHN. 239 

verbal retorts.—The same exposure of the policy 
of courts and camps, of kings, nobles, priests, and 
cardinals, takes place here as in the other plays we 
have gone through, and we shall not go into a dis- 
gusting repetition. 

This, like the other plays taken from English his- 
tory, is written in a remarkably smooth and flowing 
style, very different from some of the tragedies, 
Macbeth, for instance. The passages consist of a 
series of single lines, not running into one another. 
This peculiarity in the versification, which is most 
common in the three parts of Henri/ VI., has been as- 
signed as a reason why those plays were not written 
by Shakspeare. But the same structure of verse 
occurs in his other undoubted plays, as in Richard 
IL, and in King John. The following are instan- 



ces :■ 



" That daughter there of Spain, the lady Blanch, 
Is near to England ; look upon the years 
Of Lewis the dauphin, and that lovely maid. 
If lusty love should go in quest of beauty, 
Where should he find it fairer than in Blanch ? 
If zealous love should go in search of virtue. 
Where should he find it purer ihan in Blanch ? 
If love ambitfous sought a match of birth, 
Whose veins bound richer blood than lady Blanch? 
Such as she is, in beauty, virtue, birth, 
Is the young dauphin every way complete : 
If not complete of, say he is not she; 
And she wants nothing, to name want, 
If want it be not, that she is not he. 
He is the half part of a biassed man, 
Left to be finished by such as she ; 
And she a ftir divified excellence. 
Whose fullness of peifection lies in hioi. 
O, two such silver currents, when they join, 



240 



KING JOHN. 



Do glorify the banks that bound them in : 
And two such shores to two such streams made one, 
Two such controling bounds, t^hall you be, kings, 
To these two princes, if you marry them." 

Another iastance, which is certainly very happy 
as an example of the sioiple enumeration of a num- 
ber of particulars, is Salisbury's remonstrance against 
the second crowning of the king. 

" Therefore to be possessed with double pomp, 
To guard a title that was rich before; 
To gild reS.ned gold, to paint the lily, 
To throw a perfume on the violet, 
To smooth the ice, to add another hue 
Unto the rainbow, or with taper light 
To seek the beauteous eye of heav'n to garnish ; 
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess." 



TWELFTH NIGHT; 



WHAT YOU WILL. 



This is justly considered as one of the most de- 
lightful of Shakspeare's comedies. It is full of 
sweetness and pleasantry. It is perhaps too good- 
natured for comedy. It has little satire, and no 
spleen. It aims at the ludicrous rather than the 
ridiculous. It makes us laugh at the follies of man- 
kind, not despise them, and still less bear any ill will 
towards them. Shakspeare's comick genius resem- 
bles the bee rather in its power of extracting sweets 
from weeds or poisons, than in leaving a sting behind 
it. He gives the most amusing exaggeration of the 
prevailing foibles of his characters, but in a way 
that they themselves, instead of being offended at, 
would almost join in to humour; he rather contrives 
opportunities for them to shew themselves off in the 
happiest lights, than renders them contemptible 
in the perverse construction of the wit or malice 
21 



242 TWELFTH NIGHT,- OR, 

of others. — There is a certain stage of society in 
which people become conscious of their peculiari- 
ties and absurdities, affect to disguise what thej are, 
and set up pretensions to what they are not. This 
gives rise to a corresponding style of comed}^ the 
object of which is to detect the disguises of self- 
love, and to make reprisals on these preposterous as- 
sumptions of vanity, by marking the contrast between 
the real and the affected character as severely as pos- 
sible, and denying to those, who would impose on us for 
what they are not, even the merit which they have. 
This is the comedy of artificial life, of wit and satire, 
such as we see it in Congreve, Wycherley, Vanbrugh, 
&c. To this succeeds a state of society from which the 
same sort of affectation and pretence are banished 
by a greater knowledge of the world, or by their 
successful exposure on the stage ; and which by 
neutralizing the materials of comick character, 
both natural and artificial, leaves no comedy at 
all — but the sentimental. Such is our modern co- 
medy. There is a period in the progress of man- 
ners anteriour to both these, in which the foibles 
and follies of individuals are of nature's planting, not 
the growth of art or study ; in which they are there- 
fore unconscious of them themselves, or care not who 
knows them, if they can but have their whim out; and 
in which, as there is no attempt at imposition, the 
spectators rather receive pleasure from humouring 
the inclinations of the persons they Jaugh at, than 
w^ish to give them pain by exposing their absurdity. 
This may be called the comedy of nature, and it is 
t^ie comedy which we generally find in Shakspeare. 



WHAT YOU WILL. 243 

Whether the analysis here given be just or not, the 
spirit of his comedies is evidently quite distinct from 
that of the authors above mentioned, as it is in its 
essence the same with that of Cervantes, and also 
very frequently of Moliere, though he was more 
«ystematick in his extravagance than Shakspeare. 
Shakspeare's comedy is of a pastoral and poetical 
cast. Folly is indigenous to the soil, and shoots 
out with native, happy, unchecked luxuriance. Ab- 
surdity has every encouragement afforded it ; and 
nonsense has room to flourish in. Nothing is 
stunted by the churlish, icy hand of indifference 
or severity. The poet runs riot in a conceit, and 
idolizes a quibble. His whole object is to turn 
the meanest or rudest objects to a pleasurable ac- 
count. The relish which he has of a pun, or of 
the quaint humour of a low character, does not 
interfere with the delight with which he describes 
a beautiful image, or the most refined love. The 
clown's forced jests do not spoil the sweetness of 
the character of Viola; the same house is big 
enough to hold Malvolio, the Countess, Maria, 
Sir Toby, and Sir Andrew Ague-cheek. For 
instance, nothing can fall much lower than this 
last character in intellect or morals: yet how are 
his weaknesses nursed and dandled by Sir Toby 
into something " high fantastical," when, on Sir 
Andrew's commendation of himself for dancing 
and fencing, Sir Toby answers — '^ Wherefore are 
these things hid ? Wherefore have these gifts a 
curtain before them ? Are they like to take dust 
like mistress Moll's picture ? Why dost thou not 
go to church in a galliard, and come home in a 



244 TWELFTH NIGHT; OR, 

coranto ? My very walk should be a jig ! I would 
not so much as make water but in a cinque-pace. 
What dost thou mean ? Is this a world to hide 
virtues in ? I did think by the excellent consti- 
tution of thy leg, it was framed under the star of 
a galliard!" — How Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, and 
the Clown afterwards chirp over their cups, how they 
*' rouse the night-owl in a catch, able to draw three 
souls out of one weaver?" What can be better 
than Sir Toby's unanswerable answer to Malvolio, 
" Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there 
shall be no more cakes and ale ?" — In a word, the 
best turn is given to every thing, instead of the 
worst. There is a constant infusion of the roman- 
tick and enthusiastick, in proportion as the characters 
are natural and sincere : whereas, in the more arti- 
ficial style of comedy, every thing gives way to 
ridicule and indifference, there being nothing left 
but affectation on one side, and incredulity on 
the other.' — Much as we like Shakspeare's comedies, 
we cannot agree with Dr. Johnson that they are 
better than his tragedies; nor do we like them 
half so well. If his inclination to comedy some- 
times led him to trifle with the seriousness of trage- 
dy, the poetical and impassioned passages are the 
best parts of his comedies. The great and secret 
charm of Twelfth Night is the character of 
Viola. Much as we like catches and cakes and 
ale, there is something that we like better. We 
have a friendship for Sir Toby; we patronise 
Sir Andrew ; we have an understanding with the 
Clown, a sneaking kindness for Maria and her 
rogueries ; we feel a regard for Blalvolio, and sym- 



1 



WHAT YOU WILL. 245 

pathize with his gravity, his smiles, his cross garters, 
his yellow stockings, and imprisonment in the 
stocks. But there is something that excites in us a 
stronger feeling than all this — it is Viola's confession 
of her love. 

*^Duke. What's her history? 

Viola. A hlanky my lord, she never told her love -. 
She let concealment, like a worm i' th' bud, 
Prey on her dainaslc cheek, she pin'd in thought, 
And with a green and yellow melancholy. 
She sat like Patience on a monument, 
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed? 
We men may say more, swear more, but indeed, 
Our shews are more than will ; for still we prove 
Much in our vows, but little in our love. 

Duke. But died thy sister of her love, my boy ? 

Viola. I am all the daughters of my father's house. 
And all the brothers too ; — and yet I know not." — 

Shakspeare alone could describe the effect of his owa 
poetry. 

" Oh, it came o'er the ear like the sweet south 
That breathes upon a bank of violets. 
Stealing and giving odour." 

What we so much admire here, is not the image of 
Patience on a monument, which has been generally 
quoted, but the lines before and after it. " They 
give a very echo to the seat where love is throned." 
How long ago is it since we first learnt to repeat 
them; and still, still they vibrate on the heart, like 
the sounds which the passing wind draws from the 
trembling strings of a harp left on some desert shore! 
There are other passages of not less impassioned 
sweetness. Such is Olivia's address to Sebastian, 
21 ^ 



246 TWELFTH NIGHT ; OR, 

whom she supposes to have already deceived her in 
a promise of marriage. 

" Blame not this haste of mine : if you mean well, 
Now go with rae and with this holy man 
Into the chantry by ; there before him, 
And underneath that consecrated roof, 
Plight me the full assurance of your faith, 
That my most jealous and too doubtful soul 
May live at peace.''^ 

We have already said something of Shakspeare's 
songs. One of the most beautiful of them occurs in 
this play, with a preface of his own to it. 

" Duke. O fellow, come j the song we had last night. 
Mark it, Cesario, it is old and plain ; 
The spinsters and the knitters in the sun. 
And the free maids that weave their thread with bones, 
Do use to chant it : it is silly sooth, 
And dailies with the innocence of love. 
Like the old age. 

SONG. 

Come away, come away, death, 
And in sad cypress let me be laid j 

Fly away, fly away, breath ; 
I am slain by a fair cruel maid. 
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, 

O prepare it , 
My part of death no one so true 
Did share it. 

Not a fiower, not a flower sweet, 
On my black cofBn let there be strewn j 

Not a friend, not a frieud greet 
My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown. 
A thousand thousand sighs to save, 
Lay me, O ! where 
Sad true love never find my grave. 
Too weep there." 



WHAT YOU WILL. 24? 

Who after this will say that Shakspeare's genius 
was only fitted for comedy ? Yet after reading other 
parts of this play, and particularly the garden scene 
where Malvolio picks up the letter, if we were to 
say that his genius for comedy was less than his 
genius for tragedy, it would perhaps only prove that 
our own taste in such matters is more saturnine than 
mercurial. 

*' Enter Maria. 

Sir Toby. Here comes the little villain :— How now, my nettle 
of India P 

Maria. Get ye all three into the box- tree : Malvolio's coming 
down this walk : he has been yonder i' the sun, practising behaviour 
to his own shadow this half hour : observe him, for the love of mock- 
ery; for 1 know this letter will make a contemplative idiot of hira. 
Close, in the name of jesting ! Lie thou there ; for here come's the 
trout that must be caught with tickling. 

[They hide themselves. Maria throws dann a letter^ and Exit. 

Enter Malvolio. 

Malvolio. *Tis but fortune ; all is fortune. Maria once told me, 
she did affect me ; and I have heard herself come thus near, that, 
should she fancy, it should be one of my complexion. Besides, she 
uses me witli a more exalted respect than any one else that follows 
her. What should I think on't ? 

Sir Toby. Here's an over-weening ropue ! 

Fabian. O, peace ! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of 
him ; how he jets under his advanced plumes ! 

Sir Andrew. 'Slight, I could so beat the rogue : — 

Sir Toby Peace, I say. 

Malvolio. To be count Malvolio J — 

Sir Toby. Ah, rogue ! 

Sir Andrew. Pistol iiim, pistol him. 

Sir Toby. Peace, peace ! 

Malvolio. There is example for't j the lady of the Strachy married 
the yeoman of the wardrobe. 

Sir Andrew, Fie oq him, Jezebel ! 



248 TWELFTH NIGHT; OK, 

Fabian. O, peace ! now he's deeply in ; look, how iicaginatioB 
blows him. 

Malvolio, Having been three months married to her, sitting in my 
chair of state, 

Sir Toby. O for a stone bow, to hit him in the eye ! 

Mulvolio. Calling my officers about me, in my branch'd velvet 
gown ; having come from a day-bed, where I have left Olivia 
sleeping. 

Sir Toby. Fire and brimstone ! 

Fabian. O peace, peace ! 

Malvolio. And then to have the humour of state : and after a de- 
mure travel of regard, telling them, I know my place, as I would 

they should do theirs, — to ask for my kinsman Toby. 

Sir Toby. Bolts and shackles! 

Fabian. O, peace, peace, peace ! now, now. 

Malvolio. Seven of my people, with an obedient start, make out 
for him : 1 frown the while ; and, perchance, wind up my watch, or 
play with some rich jewel. Toby approaches: curtsies there 
to me: 

Sir Toby. Shall this fellow live ? 

Fabian. Though our silence be drawn from us with cares, yet 
peace. 

Malvolio. 1 extend my hand to him thus, quenching my familiar 
smile with an austere regard of control : 

Sir Toby. And does not Toby take you a blow o'the lips 
tben ? 

Malvolio. Saying — Cousin Toby, my fortunes having cast me oi* 
your niece, give me this prerogative of speech ; — 

Sir Toby. W hat, what ? 

Malvdio. You must amend your drunkenness. 

Fabian. Nay, patience, or we break the sinews of our plot. 

Malvolio. Besides, you waste the treasure of your time with a 
foolish knight— 

Sir Andrew. That's mp, I warrant you. 

Malvolio. One Sir Andrew 

Sir Andrew, 1 knew, 'twas I ; for many do call me fool. 

Malvolio. What employment have we here.^ 

{Taking up the letter.''^ 

The letter and bis comments on it are equally 
good. If poor Mai V olio's treatmeat afterwards is 



WHAT YOU WILL. 249 

a little hard, poetical justice is done in the unea- 
siness which Olivia suffers on account of her 
mistaken attachment to Cesario, as her insensi- 
bility to the violence of the Duke's passion is 
atoned for by the discovery of Viola's concealed love 
of him. 






! 



THE 



TWO GEiNTLEMEN OF VERONA. 



This is little more than the first outlines of a come- 
dy loosely sketched in. It is the story of a novel 
dramatised with very little labour or pretension; 
yet there are passages of high poetical spirit, and of 
inimitable quaintness of humour, which are undoubt- 
edly Shakspeare's, and there is throughout the con- 
duct of the fable, a careless grace and felicity which 
marks it for his. One of the editors (we believe, 
Mr. Pope) remarks in a marginal note to the Two 
Gentlemen of Verona—" It is observable (I know 
not for what cause) that the style of this comedy is 
less figurative, and more natural and unaffected than 
the greater part of this author's, though supposed to 
be one of the first he wrote." Yet so little does the 
editor appear to have made up his mind upon this 
subject, that we find the following note to the very 
next (the second) scene. " This whole scene, like 
many others in these plays (some of which I be- 
lieve were written by Shakspeare, and others inter- 



TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA. 251 

polated by the players) is composed of the lowest 
and most trifling conceits, to be accounted for only 
by the gross taste of the age he lived in: Populo ut 
placerent. I wish I had authority to leave them 
out, but I have done all I could, set a mark of 
reprobation upon them, throughout this edition." 
It is strange that our fastidious critick should 
fall so soon from praising to reprobating. The 
style of the familiar parts of this comedy is 
indeed made up of conceits — low they may 
be for whjrt we know, but then they are not 
poor, but rich ones. The scene of Launce with 
his dog (not that in the second, but that in the fourth 
act) is a perfect treat in the way of farcical drollery 
and invention ; nor do we think Speed's manner of 
proving his master to be in love deficient in wit or 
sense, though the style may be criticised as not sim- 
ple enouti,h for the modern taste. 

" Valentine. Why, how know you that I am io love ? 

Speed Marry, by these special marks : first, you have learned, 
like Sir Protheus, to wreathe your arms like a raal-content, to reh'sli 
a love-song like a robin red breast, to walk alone like one that had 
the pestilence, to sigh like a schoojhoy that had lost his A B C, to 
weep like a youn>/ wench that had lost her grandam, to fast like one 
th:it tdkv^s diet, to watch like one tliat fears robbing, to speak puling 
like a beggar at Hallowmas. You were wont, when you laughed, to 
crow like a cock ; when you walked, to walk like one of the lions ; 
when you fasted, it was presently after dinner; when you looked 
sadly, it was for want of money; and now you are metamorphosed 
with a mistress, that when I look on you, I can hardly think you my 
master," 

The tender scenes in this play, though not so high- 
ly wrought as in some others, have often much sweet- 
ness of sentiment and expression. There is some- 



I 



252 TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA. 

thing pretty and playful in the conversation of Julia 
with her maid, when she shews such a disposition to 
coquetry about receiving the letter from Protheus ; 
and her behaviour afterwards and her disappoint- 
meot, when she finds him faithless to his vows, re- 
mind us at a distance of Imogen's tender constancy. 
Her answer to Lucetta, who advises her against fol- 
lowing her lover in disguise, is a beautiful piece of 
poetry. 

" Lucetta. I do not seek to quench your love's hot fire. 
But qualify the fire's extreraest rage, 
Lest it should burn above the bounds of reason. 

Julia. The uiore thou damm'st it up, the more it burns ; 
The current that with gentle murmur glides, 
Thoji know'st, being stopp'd, impatiently doth rage ; 
But when his fair course is not hindered. 
He makes sweet musick with th' enamell'd stones, 
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge 
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage : 
And so by many winding nooks he strays, 
With willing sport, to the wild ocean.* 
Then let me go, and hinder not my course ; 
I'll be as patient as a gentle stream. 
And make a pastime of each weary step. 
Till the last step have brought me to my love ; 
And there I'll rest, as after much turmoil, 
A blessed soul doth in Elysium." 

If Shakspeare indexed had written only this and 
other passages in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, 
he would almost have deserved Milton's praise of 
him — 

" And sweetest Shakspeare, Fancy's child, 
Warbles his native wood-notes wild." 

But as it is, he deserves rather more praise than this. 

* The river wanders at its own sweet will. 

Wordsworth. 



MERCHANT OF VENICE. 



This is a play that, in spite of the change of 
manners, and of prejudices, still holds undisputed 
possession of the stage. Shakspeare's malignant 
has outlived Mr. Cumberland's benevolent Jew. In 
proportion as Shylock has ceased to be a popular 
bugbear, " baited with the rabble's curse," he be- 
comes a half-favourite with the philosophical part of 
the audience, who are disposed to think that Jewish 
revenge is at least as good as Christian injuries. 
Shylock is a good hater; "a man no less sinned 
against than sinning." If he carries his revenge too 
far, yet he has strong grounds for *' the lodged hate 
he bears Anthonio," which he explains with equal 
force of eloquence and reason. He seems the deposi- 
tary of the vengeance of his race ; and though the 
long habit of brooding over daily insults and injuries 
has crusted over his temper with inveterate misan- 
thropy, and hardened him against the contempt 
of mankind, this adds but little to the triumphant 
22 



254 MERCHANT OF VENICE. 

pretensions of his enemies. There is a strong, 
quick, and deep sense of justice mixed up with the 
gall and bitterness of his resentment. The constant 
apprehension of being burnt alive, plundered, banish- 
ed, reviled, and trampled on, might be supposed 
to sour the most forbearing nature, and to take 
something from that *' milk of human kindness," 
with which his persecutors contemplated his in- 
dignities. The desire of revenge is almost inse- 
parable from the senss of w rong ; and we can 
hardly help sympathizing with the proud spirit, hid 
beneath his " Jewish gaberdine," stung to mad- 
ness by repeated undeserved provocations, and 
labouring to throw oflf the load of obloquy and 
oppression heaped upon him and all his tribe, by one 
desperate act of " lawful" revenge, till the ferocious- 
ness of the means by which he is to execute his 
purpose, and the pertinacity with which he adheres 
to it, turn us against him, but even at last, when 
disappointed of the sanguinary revenge wilh which 
he had glutted his hopes, and exposed to beggary 
and contempt by the letter of the law on which 
he had insisted wilh so little remorse, we pity him, 
and think him hardly dealt with by his judges. In 
all his answers and retorts upon his adversaries, 
he has the best not only of the argument but of the 
question, reasoning on their ow n principles and prac- 
tice. They are so far from allowing of any measure 
of equal dealing, of common justice or humanity 
between themselves and the Jew, that even when 
they come to ask a favour of him, and Shylock 
reminds them that " on such a day they spit upon 
him, another spurned him, another called him dog, 






MERCHANT OF VENICE. , 255 

and for these curtesies request he'll lend them so 
much monies." — Anthonio, his old enemy, instead 
of any acknowledgment of the shrewdness and jus- 
tice of his remonstrance, which would have been 
preposterous in a respectable Catholick merchant in 
those times, threatens him with a repetition of the 
same treatment — 

" I am as like to call thee so again, 

To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too." 

After this, the appeal to the Jew's mercy, as if 
there were any common principle of right and wrong 
between them, is the rankest hypocrisy, or the 
blindest prejudice ; and the Jew's answer to one of 
Anthonio's friends, who asks him what hi» pound of 
forfeit flesh is good for, is irresistible — 

" To bait fish withal ; if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my 
revenge. He hath disgrac'd me, and hinder'd me of half a mil - 
lion, laugh'd at my losses, mock'd at ray gains, scorn'd my nation, 
thwarted my bargains, cool'd my friends, heated mine enemies ; and 
what's his reason .'' I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes ; hath not a 
Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions ; fed with 
the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same dis- 
eases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same 
winter and summer that a Christian is ? If you prick us, do we not 
bleed p If you tickle us, do we not laugh ? If you poison us do we 
not die.P and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge ? If we are like 
you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a 
Christian, what is his humility I' revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, 
what should his sufferance be by Christian example ? why revenge. 
The villany you teach me I will execute, and it shall go hard but I 
will better the instruction.*' 

The whole of the trial scene, both before and after 
the entrance of Portia, is a masterpiece of drama- 



256 MERCHANT OF VENICE. 

tick skill. The legal acuteness, the passionate de- 
clamations, the sound maxims of jurisprudence, the 
wit and irony interspersed in it, the fluctuations of 
hope and fear in the different persons, and the com- 
pleteness and suddenness of the catastrophe, cannot 
be surpassed. Shylock, \vho is his own counsel, 
defends himself well, and is triumphant on all the 
general topicks that are urged against him, and only 
fails through a legal flaw. Take the following as an 
instance ; — 

•' Shylock. What judgment shall I dread, doiog no wrong ? 
You have among you many a purchas'd slave, 
Which, like your asses, and your dogs, and mules, 
You use in abject and in slavish part, 
Because you bought them :— shall I say to you, 
Ijet them be free, marry them to your heirs ? 
Why sweat they under burdens ? let their beds 
Be made as soft as yours, and let their palates 
Be season'd with sueh viands ? you will answer, 
The slaves are ours :— so do 1 answer you : 
The pound of flesh, which I demand of hiai, 
Is dearly bought, is mine, and I will have it: 
If you deny me, fie upon your law ! 
There is no force iu the decrees of Venice : 
1 stand for judgment : auswer ; shall I have it ?'* 

The keenness of his revenge awakes all his facul- 
ties ; and he beats back all opposition to his purpose, 
whether grave or gay, whether of wit or argument, 
with an equal degree of earnestness and self-posses- 
sion. His characterls displayed as distinctly in other 
less prominent parts of the play, and we may collect 
from a few sentences the history of his life— his de- 
scent and origin, his thrift and doraestick economy, 
his affection for his daughter, whom he loves next to 
his wealth, his courtship and his first present to Leah 



MERCHANT OF VENICE. 257 

his wife ! " I would not have parted with it" (the 
ring which he first gave her) " for a wilderness of 
monkies !" What a fine Hebraism is implied in this 
expression ! 

Portia is not a very great favourite with us ; neither 
are we in love with her maid, Nerissa. Portia has a 
certain degree of afiectation and pedantry about her, 
which is very unusual in Shakspeare's women, but 
which perhaps was a proper qualification for the office 
of a " civil doctor," which she undertakes and exe- 
cutes so successfully. The speech about Mercy is 
very well ; but there are a thousand finer ones in 
Shakspeare. We do not admire the scene of the 
caskets; and object entirely to the Black Prince 
Morocchius. We should like Jessica better if she 
had not deceived and robbed her father, and Lorenzo, 
if he had not married a Jewess, though he thinks he 
has a right to wrong a Jew. The dialogue between 
this newly married couple by moonlight, beginning 
" On such a night," &c. is a collection of classical 
elegancies. Launcelot, the Jew's man, is an honest 
fellow. The dilemma in which he describes himself 
placed between his " conscience and the fiend," the 
one of which advises him to run away from his mas- 
ter's service and the other to stay in it, is exquisitely 
humorous. 

Gratiano is a very admirable subordinate charac- 
ter. He is the jester of the piece : yet one speech of 
his, in his own defence, contains a whole volume of 
wisdom. 

" Jnthonio. 1 hold the world but as the world, Gratiaoo, 
A stage, where every one must play his part j 
And mine a sad one. 

22* 



258 MERCHANT OF VENICE. 

Gratiano. Let me play the fool : 
With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come y 
And let my liver rather heat with wine, 
Than my heart cool with mortifying groans. 
Why should a man, whose blood is warm within, 
Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster ? 
Sleep when he wakes ? and creep into the jaundice 
By being peevish ? I tell the what, Anthonio— 
I love thee, and it is my love that speaks j — 
There are a sort of men, whose visages 
Do cream and mantle like a standing pond ; 
And do a wilful stillness entertain, 
With purpose to be drest in an opinion 
Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit ; 
As who should say, / am Sir Oracle, 
Arid nhen I ope my lips, let no dog bark ' 
O, my Anthonio, I do know of these, 
That therefore only are reputed wise, 
For saying nothing ; who, I am rery sure, 
If they should speak, would almost damn those ears, 
Which hearing them, would call their brothers, fools. 
I'll tell thee more of this another time : 
But fish not with tliis melancholy bait. 
For this fool's gudgeoD,this opinion." 

Gratiano's speech on the philosophy of love, aiul 
the effect of habit in taking off the force of passion, 
is as full of spirit and good sense. The graceful 
winding up of this play in the fifth act, after the tra-- 
gick business is despatched, is one of the happiest in- 
stances of Shakspeare's knowledge of the principles 
of the drama. We do not mean the pretended quar- 
rel between Portia and Nerissa and their husbands 
about the rings, which is amusing enough, but the 
conversation just before and after the return of Portia 
to her own house, beginning " How sweet the moon- 
light sleeps upon this bank," and ending " Peace ! 
how the mooQ sleeps with EndymioD, and would not 



MERCHANT OF VENICE. 259 

be awaked." There is a number of beautiful thoughts 
crowded into that short space, and linked together 
by the most natural transitions. 

When we ftrst went to see Mr. Kean in Shylock, 
we expected to see, what we had been used to see, 
a decrepid old man, bent with age, and ugly with 
mental deformity, grinning with deadly malice, with 
the venom of his heart congealed in the expression 
of his countenance, sullen, morose, gloomy, inflexi- 
ble, brooding over one idea, that of his hatred, and 
fixed on one unalterable purpose, that of his revenge. 
We were disappointed, because we had taken our 
idea from other actors, not from the play. There 
is no proof there that Shylock is old, but a single 
line, " Bassanio and old Shylock, both stand forth," 
— which does not imply that he is infirm with age — 
and the circumstance that he has a daughter mar- 
riageable, which does not imply that he is old at all. 
It would be too much ta say that his body should be 
made crooked and deformed to answer to his mind, 
which is bowed down and warped with prejudices 
and passion. That he has but one idea, is not true : 
he has more ideas than any other person in the piece ; 
and if he is intense and inveterate in the pursuit of 
his purpose, he shews the utmost elasticity, vigour, 
and presence of mind, in the means of attaining it. 
But so rooted was our habitual impression of the part 
from seeing it caricatured in the representation, that 
it was only from a careful perusal of the play itself 
that we saw our errour. The stage is not in general 
the best place to study our author's characters in. — ■ 
It is too often filled with traditional commonplace 
conceptions of the part, handed down from sire to 



260 MERCHANT OF VENICE. 

son, and suited to the taste of the great vulgar and 
the sfiiall. — "'Tis an unweeded garden: things rank 
and gross do merely gender in it I" If a man of ge- 
oius comes once in an age to clear away the rubbish, 
to malte it fruitful and wholesome, they cry, " 'Tis a 
bad school : it may be like nature, it may be like 
Shakspeare, but it is not like us." Admirable cri- 
ticks \ — 



THE AVINTER'S TALE. 



AV^E wonder that Mr. Pope should have entertaiaed 
doubts of the genuiaeness of this play. He was, we 
suppose, shocked (as a certain critick suggests) at 
the Chorus, Time, leaping over sixteen years with 
his crutch between the third and fourth act, and at 
Antigonus's landing with the infant Perdita on the 
seacoast of Bohemia. These slips or blemishes how- 
ever do not prove it not to be Shakspeare's ; for he 
was as likely to fall into them as any body ; but we 
do not know any body but himself who could pro- 
duce the beauties. The stuff of which the tragick 
passion is composed, the roniantick sweetness, the 
comick humour, are evidently his. Even the crab- 
bed and tortuous style of the speeches of Leontes, 
reasoning on his own jealousy, beset with doubts and 
fears, and entangled more and more in the thorny 
labyrinth, bears every mark of Shakspeare's peculiar 
manner of conveying the painful struggle of different 
thoughts and feelings, labouring for utterance, and 
almost strangled in the birth. For instance : — 

" Ha' not you seen, Camillop 
(.But that's past doubt : you have, or your eye-glass 



262 THE WINTER'S TALE. 

Is thicker than a cuckold's horn) or heard P 
(For to a vision so apparent, rumour 
Cannot be mute) or thought (for cogitation 
Resides not within man that does not think) 
My wife is slippery ; if thou wiit, confess, 
Or else be impudently negative. 
To have nor eyes, nor ears, nor thought." — 

Here Leontes is confounded with his passion, and 
does not know which way to turn himself, to give 
words to the anguish, rage, and apprehension, which 
tug at his breast. It is only as he is worked up into a 
clearer conviction of his wrongs by insisting on the 
grounds of his unjust suspicious to Camillo, who ir- 
ritates him by his opposition, that he bursts out into 
the following vehement strain of bitter indignation : 
yet even here his passion staggers, and is as it were 
oppressed with its own intensity. 

" Is whispering nothing ? 
Is leaning cheek to cheek p is meeting ooses ? 
Kissing with inside lip i^ stopping the career 
Of laughter with a sigh ? (a note infallible 
Of breaking honesty !) horsing foot on foot? 
Skulking in corners ? wishing clocks more swift p 
Hours, minutes ? the noon, midnight p and all eyes 
Blind with the pin and "Keh, but theirs ; theirs only. 
That would, unseen, be wicked p is this nothing? 
Why then the world, and all that's in't, is nothing, 
The covering sky is nollung, Bohemia's nothing, 
My wife is nothing !" 

The character of Hermione is as much distinguish- 
ed by its saint-like resignation and patient forbear- 
ance, as that of Paulina is by her zealous and spirit- 
ed remonstrances against the injustice done to the 
queen, and by her devoted attachment to her mis- 
fortunes. Hermione^s restoration to her husband 



THE WINTER'S TALE. 263 

and her child, after her long separation from them, 
is as affecting in itself as it is striking in the repre- 
sentation. Camillo, and the old shepherd and his 
son, are subordinate but not uninteresting instruments 
in the developement of the plot, and though last, not 
least, comes Autolycus, a very pleasant, thriving 
rogue; and (what is the best feather in the cap of all 
knavery) he escapes with impunity in the end. 

The Winter's Tale is one of the best-acting 
of our author's plays. We remember seeing it with 
great pleasure many years ago. It was on the night 
that King took leave of the stage, when he and 
Mrs. Jordan played together in the afterpiece of the 
Wedding day. Nothing could go ofi* with more eclatt 
with more spirit, and grandeur of effect. Mrs. Sid- 
dons played Hermione, and in the last scene acted 
the painted statue to the life — with true monumental 
dignity and noble passion; Mr. Kemble, in Leon- 
tes, worked himself up into a very fine classical 
phrenzy ; and Bannister, as Autolycus, roared as 
loud for pity as a sturdy beggar could do, who felt 
none of the pain he counterfeited, and was sound of 
wind and limb. We shall never see these parts so 
acted again ; or if we did, it would be in vain. Ac- 
tors grow old, or no longer surprise us by their no- 
velty. But true poetry, like nature, is always young ; 
and we still read the courtship of Florizel and Per- 
dita, as we welcome the return of spring, with the 
same feelings as ever. 

*^ Florizel. Thou dearest Perdlta, 
With tliese forc'd thoughts, I pr'ythee, darken not 
The mirth o'the the feast : or, I'll be thine, my fair. 
Or not ray father's : for 1 cannot be 



264 THE WINTER'S TALE. 

Mine own, nor any thing to any, if 

I be not thine. To this I ana most constant, 

Tho' destiny say, No. Be merry, gentle ; 

Strangle such thoughts as these, with any thing 

That you behold the while. Your guests are coming : 

Lift up your countenance ; as it were the day 

Of celebration of that nuptial, which 

We two have sworn shall come. 

Ferdita. O lady fortune^ 
Stand you auspicious ! 

Enter Shepherd, Clorvn, Mopsa, Dohcas, Servants ; ivith Polixenes. 
and Cami llo, disguUed. 

Florisel. See, your guests approach : 
Address yourself to entertain them sprightly, 
And let's be red with mirth. 

Shepherd. Fie, daughter J when my old wife liv'd, upon 
This day, she was both paotler, butler, cook j 
Both dame and servant : welcom'd all, serv'd all : 
Would sing her song, and dance iier turn : now here 
At upper end o' the table, now i' the middle : 
On his shoulder, and his : her face o' fire 
With labour ; and the thing she took to quench it 
She would to each one sip. You are retir'd, 
As if you were a feasted one, and not 
The hostess of the meeting. Pray you, bid 
These unknown friends to us welcome ; for it is 
A way to make us better friends, more known. 
Come quench your blushes ; and present yourself 
That which you are, mistress o' the feast. Come on, 
And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing. 
As your good flock shall prosper. 

Perdita. Sir, welcome ! [To Poliicenes and Camillo. 

It is my father's will I should take on me 
The hostee?-ship o' the day : you're welcome, sir ! 
Give me tfiose flowers there, Dorcas. — Reverend sirs, 
For you tliere's rosemarj' and rue ; these keep 
Seeming, and savour, all the winter long : 
Grace and remembrance be unto you both, 
And welcome to our shearing I 



THE WINTER'S TALE. 265 

Polixenes. Shepherdess, 
(A fair one are you) well you fit our ages 
With flowers of winter, 

Perdita. Sir, the year growing ancient, 
Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth 
Of trembling winter, the fairest flowers o' the season 
Are our carnations, and streak'd gilly-fiowers. 
Which some call nature's bastards: of that kind 
Our rustick garden's barren; and I care not 
To get slips of them. 

Polixenes. Wherefore, gentle maiden, 
Do you neglect them ? 

Perdiia. For I have heard it said 
There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares 
With great creating nature. 

Polixenes. Say, there he : 
Yet nature is made better by no mean. 
But nature makes that mean : so, o'er that art 
Which, you say, adds to nature, is an art 
That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry 
A gentler scyon to the wildest stock ; 
And make conceive a bark of baser kind 
By bud of nobhr race. This is an art 
Which dops mend nature, change it rather; but 
The art itself is nature. 

Perdita. So it is. 

P'dixenes. Then make your garden rich in gilly-flowers, 
And do not call them bastards. 

Perdita. I'll not put 
The dibble in earth, to set one slip of them; 
No more than, were 1 painted, 1 would wish 
This youth should say, 'twere well ; and only therefore 
Desire to breed by me.— Here's flowers for you ; 
Hot lavender, mint'^, savoury, marjoram ; 
The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun. 
And with liim rises, weeping •• these are flowers 
Of middle stunmer, and, 1 think, they are given 
To men of middle age. You are very welcome. 

Cainillo. I should leave grazing, were I of your flock, 
And only live by gazing. 

23 



1 



266 THE WINTER'S TALE. 

Perdita. Out, alas ! 
You'd be so lean, that blasts of January 

Would blow you through and through. Now, my fairest friends, 
I would I had some flowers o' the spring, that might 
Becoffie your time of day ; and your's, and your's, 
That wear upon your virgin branches yet 
Your maiden -heads growing : O Proserpina, 
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou leV'st fall 
From Dis's wagon ! dafibdils, 
That come before swallow dares, and take 
The winds of March with beauty : violets dim, 
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes, 
Or Cytherea's breath ; pale primroses, 
That die unmarried, ere they can behold 
Bright Phoebus in his strength (a malady 
Most incident to maids ;) bold oxlips, and 
The crown-imperial ; lilies of all kinds, 
The fleur-de-lis being one ! O, these 1 lack 
To make you garlands of ; and, my sweet friend 
To strow him o'er and o'er. 

Florizel. What, like a corse ? 

Perdita. No, like a bank, for love to lie and play on ; 
Not like a corse ; or if— not to be buried, 
But quick, and in mine arms. Come, take your flowers; 
Methinks, I play as I have seen them do 
In Whitsun pastorals : sure this robe of mine 
Does change my disposition. 

Flo7-izel. What you do, 
Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet, 
I'd have you do it ever : when you sing, 
I'd have you buy and sell so ; so give alms ; 
Pray so j and for the ordering your afiairs, 
To sing them too. When you do dance, I wish you 
A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do 
Nothing but that .- move still, still so, 
And own no other function. Each your doing, 
So singular in each particular, 
Crowns what you're doing in the present deeds, 
That all your acts are queens. 

Perdita. O Doricle?, 
Your praises are too large ; but that your youth 
And the true blood, which peeps forth fairly through it, 



THE WINTER'S TALE. 267 

Do plainly give you out an unstained shepherd ; 
With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles, 
You woo'd me the false way. 

Ftorisel. I think you have 
As little skill to fear, as I have pui-pose 
To put you to't But come, our dance, I pray : 
Your hand, my Perdita : so turtles pair, 
That never mean to part. 

Perdita. I'll swear for 'em. 

Polixenes. This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever 
Ran on the green -sward ; nothing she does, or seems, 
But smacks of something greater than herself, 
Too noble for this place. 

Camillo, He tells her something 
That makes her blood look out : good sooth, she is 
The queen of curds and cream." 

This delicious scene is interrupted by the father 
of the prince discovering himself to Florizel, and 
haughtily breaking off the intended match between 
his son and Perdita. When Polixenes goes out 
Perdita says, 

" Even here undone : 
I was not much afraid ; for once or twice 
I was about to speak ; and tell him plainly, 
The self-same sun that shines upon his court, 
Hides not his visage from our cottage, but 
Looks on't alike. Wilt please you, sir, begone ? 

[To FloristL 
I told you what would come of this. Beseech you. 
Of your own state take care : this dream of mine, 
Being now awake, I'll queen it no inch farther. 
But milk my ewes and weep." 

As Perdita, the supposed shepherdess, turns out 
to be the daughter of Hermione, and a princess 
in disguise, both feelings of the pride of birth and 
the claims of nature, are satisfied by the fortunate 
event of the stor}'-, and the fine romance of poetry 
is reconciled to the strictest court etiquette. 



ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. 



All's Well that ends Well is one of the most 
pleasing of our author's comedies. The interest 
is however more of a serious than of a comick na- 
ture. The character of Helen is one of great 
sweetness and delicacy. She is placed in circum- 
stances of the most critical kind, and has to court 
her husband both as a virgin and a wife: yet the 
most scrupulous nicely of female modesty is not 
once violated. There is not one thought or action 
that ought to bring a blush into her cheeks, or that 
for a moment lessens her in our esteem. Perhaps 
the romautick attachment of a beautiful and vir- 
tuous girl to one placed above her hopes by the 
circumstances of birth and fortune, was never so 
exquisitely expressed as in the reflections which she 
utters when young Roussillon leaves his mother's 
house, under whose protection she has been brought 
up with him, to repair to the French king's court. 

*' Helen. Oh, were that all — I think not on my father, 
And these great tears gnice his remembrance more 
Than those I shed for him. What was he like ^ 

I have forgot him. My imagination 

Carries no favour in it, but my Bertram'? 



ALL'S WELL TJ^AT ENDS WELL. 269 

I am undone, thf ' j iviug, aone, 
If Bertram be away. It were all one 
That I should love a b- '* Particular star, 
And think towtd it ; heiv. '; a novo me: 
In his bright r?:Hr:nc.- and .'o;L.u;ra' light 
Must I be comfortea, nut iu Wh spi-tre. 
Th' ambition in my love thus plagues itself ; 
The hind that would be mated by the lion, 
Muit die for love. 'Twas pretty, 'tlio a plague, 
To see him every hour, to sit and draw 
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls 
In our heart's table : heart too capable 
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour. 
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy 
Must sanctify his relicks." 

The interest excited by this beautiful picture of 
/%& fond and innocent heart is kept up afterwards by 
her resolution to follow him to France, the success 
of her experiment in restoring the king's health, her 
demanding Bertram in marriage as a recompense, 
his leaving her in disdain, her interyiew with him 
afterwards disguised as Diana, a young lady whom 
he importunes with his secret addresses, and their 
final reconciliation when the consequences of her 
stratagem and the {)roofs of her love are fully made 
known. The persevering gratitude of the French 
king to his benefactress, who cures him of a languish- 
ing distemper by a prescription hereditary in her 
family, the indulgent kindness of the Countess, 
whose pride of birth yields, almost without a strug- 
gle, to her affection for Helen, the honesty and up- 
rightness of the good old lord Lafeu, make very in- 
teresting parts of the picture. The wilful stub- 
bornness and youthful petulance of Bertram are also 
very admirably described. The comick part of the 
play turns on the folly, boasting, and cowardice of 
23 * 



SrO ALL'S WELL TH4T ENDS WELL. 

ParoIIes, a parasite t .; h^r- - ? Bertram's, the 

detection of whose fa' e p "^ ravery and 

honour forms a very ^...._, .^, He is first 

found out by the o. > >.ti, who ^ays, " The 

soul of this man is in -'is cloihes;" and it is proved 
afterwards that his heart is in his tongue, and that 
both are false anf^ hollow. The adventure of" the 
bringing off of his drum" has become proverbial as 
a satire on all ridiculous and blustering undertakings, 
which the person never means to perform : nor can 
any thing be more severe than what one of the bye- 
standers remarks uj)on what Parolles says of him- 
self, '' Is it possible he should know what he is, and 
be that he is ?" Yet Parolles himself gives the best 
solution of the difficulty afterwards, when he is thank- v 
ful to escape with his life and the loss of character; 
for, so that he can live on, he is by no means 
squeamish about the loss of pretensions, to which he 
had sense enough to know he had no real claim, 
and which he had assumed only as a means to 
live. 

" Parolles. Yet I am thanlcftil : if my heart were great, 
'Twould burst at tliis. Captaii) I'll be do more, 
But 1 win eat and driok, and^leep as soft 
As captain shall, bimpiy the thing I am 
Shall make me live: who knows himself a braggart, 
Let him fear this ; for it shall come to pass, 
That eve^y hragg-trt shall h6 found an ass. 
Rust sword, cool blushes, and Parolles live 
Safest lu shame . being fool'd, by fooi'ry thrive ; 
There's place and means for every man alive. 
I'll afler them. 

Th^ story of All's Well that ends Well, 
and of several others of Shakspeare's plays, is taken 



ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. 2T1 

from Boccacio. The poet has dramatised the origin- 
al novel with great skill and comick spirit, and has 
preserved all the beauty of character and sentiment 
without improving upon it, which was impossible. 
There is indeed in Boccacio's serious pieces a truth, 
a pathos, and an exquisite refinement of sentiment, 
hich is hardly to be met with in any other prose 
\ riter whatever. Justice has not been done him by 
the world. He has in general passed for a mere nar- 
rator of lascivious tales or idle jests. This character 
probably originated in his obnoxious attacks on the 
monks, and has been kept up by thegrossness of man- 
kind, who revenged their own want of refinement on 
Boccacio, and only saw in his writings what suited 
the coarseness of their own tastes. But the truth is, 
that h^^ns carried sentiment of every kind to its 
very highest purity and perfection. By sentiment 
we would here understand the habitual workings 
of some one powerful feeling, where thfetieart reposes 
almost entirely upon itself, without the violent excite- 
ment of opposing duties or untoward circumstances. 
In this way, nothing ever came up to the story of 
Frederigo Alberigi and his Falcon. The perseve- 
rance in attachment, the spirit of gallantry and gene- 
rosity displayed in it, has no parallel in the history 
of heroical sacrifices. The feeling is so unconscious 
too, and involuntary, is brought out in such small, 
unlooked-for, and unostentatious circumstances, as 
to show it to have been woven into the very nature 
and soul of the author. The story of Isabella is 
scarcely less fine, and is more affecting in the cir- 
cumstances and in the catastro[)he. Dryden has 
done justice to the impassioned eloquence of the 



272 ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. 

Tancred and Sigismunda; but has not given an 
adequate idea of the wild preternatural interest of 
the story of Honoria. Cimon and Iphigene is by no 
means one of the best, notwithstanding the popularity 
of the subject. The proof of unalterable affection 
given in the story of Jeronymo, and the simple 
touches of nature and picturesque beauty in the sto- 
ry of the two holiday lovers, who were poisoned by 
tasting a leaf in the garden at Florence, are perfect 
masterpieces. The epithet of Divine was well be- 
stowed on this great painter of the human heart. 
The invention implied in his different tales is im- 
mense : but we are not to infer that it is all his own. 
He probably availed himself of all the common tradi- 
tions which were floating in his time, and which he 
was the first to appropriate. Homer appears the 
most original of all authors — probably for no other 
reason than that we can trace the plagiarism no far- 
ther. Boccacio has furnished subjects to number- 
less writers since his time, both dramalick and narra- 
tive. The story of Griselda is borrowed from his 
Decameron by Chaucer; as is the Knight's Tale 
(Palamon and Arcite) from bis poem of the Theseid, 



LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 



If we were to part with any of the author's come- 
dies, it should be this. Yet we should be loth to 
part with Don Adriano de Armado, that mighty- 
potentate of nonsense, or his page, that handful of 
wit ; with Nathaniel the curate, or Holofernes the 
schoolmaster, and their dispute after dinner on " the 
golden cadences of poesy ;" with Costard the clown, 
or Dull the constable. Biron is too accomplished a 
character to be lost to the world, and yet he could 
not appear without his fellow courtiers and the king : 
and if we were to leave out the ladies, the gentlemen 
would have no mistresses. So that we believe we 
may let the whole play stand as it is, and we shall 
hardly venture to " set a mark of reprobation on it." 
Still we have some objections to the style, which 
we think savoursmore of the pedantick spirit of Shak- 
speare's time than of his own genius ; more of con- 
troversial divinity, and the logick of Peter Lombard, 
than of the inspiration of the Muse. It transports 
us quite as much to the manners of the court, and the 
quirks of courts of law, as to the scenes of nature, or 



274 LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 

or the fairy land of his own imagination. Shak- 
speare has set himself to imitate the tone of polite 
conversation then prevailing among the fair, the 
witty, and the learned, and he has imitated it but 
too faithfully. It is as if the hand of Titian had 
been employed to give grace to the curls of a full bot- 
tomed periwig, or Raphael had attempted to give ex- 
pression to the tapestry figures in the House of Lords. 
Shakspeare has put an excellent description of (his 
fashionable jargon into the mouth of the critical 
Holofernes "as too picked, too spruce, too affected, 
too odd, as it were, too peregrinate, as I may call it ;" 
and tiothing can be more marked than the difference 
when he breaks loose from the trammels he had im- 
posed on himself, "as light as bird from brake," and 
speaks in his own person. We think, for instance, 
that in the following soliloquy the poet has fairly got 
the start of Queen Elizabeth and her maids of honour ; 

^^ Biron. O ! and I, forsooth, in love, 
1 that have been love's whip ; 
A very beadle to an amorous sigh : 
A critickj nay, a night-watch constable, 
A domiueeruig pedant o'er the boy, 
Thau whom no mortal more magnificent. 
This whirapled, whining, purblind, wayward boy, 
This signior Junio, giant dwarf, Don Cupid, 
Regent of love-rhimes, lord of folded arms, 
Th' anointed sovereign of sighs and groans : 
Liege of all loiterers and malecontents, 
Dread prince of plackets, king of codpieces, 
Sole iroperator, and great general 
Of trotting parators (O my little heart !) 
And I to be a corporal of his field, 
And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop ! 
What ? 1 love ! I sue ! I seek a wife ! 
A, woman, that is like a German clock, 



LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 275 

Still a repairing; ever out of frame; 

And never going aright, being a watch, 

And being watch'd, that it may still go right P 

Nay, to be perjur'd, which ia worst of all : 

And among three to love the worst of all, 

A whitely wanton with a velvet brow, 

With two pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes ; 

Ay, and by heav'n, one that will do the deed, 

Though Argus were her eunuch and her guard; 

And I to sigh for her ! to watch for her ! 

To pray for her ! Go to ; it is a plague 

That Cupid will impose for my neglect 

Of his almighty dreadful little might. 

Well, 1 will love, write, sigh, pray, sue, and groan : 

Some men must love my lady, and some Joan." 

The character of Biron drawn by Rosaline and 
that which Biron gives of Boyet are equally happy. 
The observations on the use and abuse of study, and 
on the power of beauty to quicken the understanding 
as well as the senses, are excellent. The scene 
which has the greatest dramatick effect is that in 
which Biron, the king, Longaville, and Dumain, 
successively detect each other and are detected in 
their breach of their vow and in their profession of 
attachment to their several mistresses, in which they 
suppose themselves to be overheard by no one. The 
reconciliation between these lovers and their sweet- 
hearts is also very good, and the penance which 
Rosaline imposes on Biron, before he can expect to 
gain her consent to marry him, full of propriety and 
beauty. 

" Rosaline. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Biron, 
Before I saw you : and the world's large tongue 
Proclaims you for a man replete with mocks ; 
Full of comparisons, and wounding flouts ,- 
Which you on all estates will execute, 



1 



276 LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. 

That lie within the mercy of your wit. 

To weed this wormwood from your faithful brain ; 

And therewithal to win n»e, if you please, 

(Without the which I am not to be won) 

You shall tliis twelvemonth term from day to day 

Visit the speechless sick, and still converse 

With groaning wretches j and your task shall be, 

With all the fierce endeavour of your wit, 

T' enforce the pained impotent to smile. 

Biron. To move wild laughter in the throat of death .^ 

It cannot be : it is impossible : 

Mirth ciinriot move a soul in agony. 
Rosaline. Why, that's the way to choke a gibing spirit, 

Whose influence is begot of that loose grace, 

Which shallow laughins; hearers give to fools : 

A jest's prosperity lies in the ear 

Of him that hears it ; never in the tongue 

Of him that makes it : then, if sickly ears, 

DeaPd with the clamours of their own dear groans, 

Will hear your idle scorns, continue then, 

And I will have yoii, and that fault withal ; 

But, if they will not, throw away that spirit, 

And I shall find you empty of that fault. 

Right joyful of your reformation. 

'' Biron. A twelvemonth ? WelF, befall what will befall, 
I'll jest a twelvemonth in a hospital." 

The famous cuckoo song closes the play : but we 
shall add no more criticisms : " the words of Mercury 
are harsh after the songs of Apollo." 



MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 



Tins admirable comedy used to be frequentlj 
acted till of late years. Mr. Garrick's Benedick 
was one of his most celebrated characters ; and 
Mrs. Jordan, we have understood, played Beatrice 
very delightfully. The serious part is still the 
most prominent here, as in other instances that we 
have noticed. Hero is the principal figure in the 
piece, and leaves an indelible impression on the 
mind by her beauty, her tenderness, and the hard 
trial of her love. The passage in which Claudio 
first makes a confession of his affection towards 
her conveys as pleasing an image of the entrance 
of love into a youthful bosom as can well be im- 
agined. 

"Oh, my lord, 
When you went onward with this ended action, 
I look'd U[i0n her with a soldier's eye, 
That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand 
Than to drive liking to the name of love ; 
But now I am return'd and that war-thoughts 
Have left their places vacant ; in their rooms 
Come thronging soft and delicate desires, 
AH prompting me how fair young Hero is. 
Saying, I lik'd her ere I went to wars." 

In the scene at the altar, when Claudio, urged on 
by the villain Don John, brings the charge of in- 
24 



278 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 

continence against her, and as it were divorces her 
in the very marriage-ceremonv, her appeals to her 
ovrn conscious innocence and honour are made with 
the most affecting simplicity. 

" Claudia. No, Leonato, 
I never tempted her with word too large, 
But, as a brother to his sister, shew'd 
Bashful sincerity, and comely love. 

Hero. And seem'd I ever otherwise to you ? 

Claudio. Out on thy seeming, I will write against it: 
You seem to me as Dian in her orb. 
As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown ; 
But you are more intemperate in your blood 
Than Venus, or those pampei 'd animals 
That rage in savage sensuality. 

Hero. Is my lord well, that he doth speak so wide ? 

Leonato. Are these things spoken, or do I but dream ? 

John. Sir, they are spoken, and these things are true. 

Benedick. This looks not like a nuptial. 

Hero. True! OGodl"— 

The justification of Hero in the end, and her re- 
storation to the confidence and arms of her lover, is 
brought about by one of those temporary consign- 
ments to the grave of which Shakspeare seems to 
have been fond. He has perhaps explained the 
theory of this predilection in the following lines : — 

*' Friar. She dying, as it must be so maintain'd, 
Upon the instant that she wns accus'd. 
Shall be lamented, pity'd, and excus'd, 
Of every hearer : for it so falls out, 
That what we have we prize not to the worth, 
While we enjoy it ; but being lack'd and lost, 
Why then we rack the value ; then we find 
The virtue, that possession would not shew us 
W'hilst it was ours.— So will it fare with Claudio: 
When he shall hear she dy'd upon his words, 
The idea of her love shall sweetly creep 



iMUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 279 

Into his study of imagination ; 

Aud every lovely organ of her life 

Shall come apparel'd in more precious habit, 

More moving, delicate, and full of life, 

Into the eye and prospect of his soul, 

Than when she liv'd indeed." 

The principal comick characters in Much ado 
ABOUT Nothing, Benedick and Beatrice, are both 
essences in their kind. His character as a woman- 
hater is admirably supported, and his conversion to 
matrimony is no less happily effected by the pre- 
tended story of Beatrice's love for him. It is hard 
to say which of the two scenes is the best, that of 
the trick which is thus practised on Benedick, or 
that in which Beatrice is prevailed on to take pity 
on him by overhearing her cousin and her maid 
declare (which they do on purpose) that he is dying 
of love for her. There is something delightfully 
picturesque in the manner in which Beatrice k de- 
scribed as coming to hear the plot which is contrived 
against herself— 

" For look where Beatrice, like a lapwing, runs 
Close by the ground, to hear our conference." 

In consequence of what she hears (not a word of 
which is true) she exclaims when these good-natured 
informants are gone, 

*' What fire is in mine ears ? Can this be true ? 

Stand I condemn'd for pride and scorn so much ? 
Contempt, farewell ! and maiden pride adieu ! 

No glory lives behind the back of such. 
And, Benedick, love on, I will requite thee ; 

Taming my wild heart to thy loving hand ; 
If thou dost love, my kindness shall incite thee 

To bind our loves up in an holy band : 



280 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. 

For others say thou dost deserve j and I 
Believe it better than reportingly." 

And Benedick, on his part, is equally sincere in his 
repentance with equal reason, after he has heard the 
grey-beard, Leonato, and his friend, " Monsieur 
Love," discourse of the desperate state of his sup- 
posed inamorata. 

"This can be do trick; the conference was sadly borne. — They 
have the trulli of this from Hero. They seem to pity the lady j it 
seems her afiectioas have the full bent. Love me ! why, it must be 
requited. I hear how I am ceusar'd : they .^ay, I will bear myself 
proudly, if I perceive the love come from her ; they say too, that she 
will rather die than give any sign of affection. — 1 did never think to 
marry : I must not seem pr oud :— happy are they that hear their 
detractions, and can put them to mending. They say, the lady is 
fair; 'tis a truth, I can bear them witness : and virtuous ;— 'tis so, I 
cannot reprove it : and wise — but for loving me: — by my troth it is 
no addition to her wit; — nor no great argument of her folly, for I 
will be horribly in love with her. — 1 may chance to have some odd 
quirks and remnants of wit broken on me, because I have rail'd so 
long against marriage: but doth not the appetite alter? A matt 
lores the meat in his youth, that he cannot endure in his age. — 
Shall quipsj and sentences, and these paper bullets of the brain, awe 
a man from the career of his humour ? No : the world must be 
peopled. When I said, I would die a bachelor, I did not think I 
should live till I were marry 'd.— Here comes Beatrice : by this day, 
she's a fair^ lady : I do spy some marks of love in her." 

The beauty of all this arises from the characters 
of the persons so entrapped. Benedick is a profess- 
ed and staunch enemy to marriage, and gives very 
plausible reasons for the faith that is in him. And as 
to Beatrice, she persecutes him all day with her 
jests (so that he could hardly think of being troubled 
with them at night) she not only turns him but 
all other things into jest, and is proof against every 
thing serious. 



MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING 281 

" Hero. Disdain and scorn ride sparkling in her eyes, 
Misprising what they look on ; and her wit 
Values itself so highly, that to her 
All matter else seems weak : she cannot love. 
Nor take no shape nor project of afiFectioo, 
She is so self- endeared. 

Ursula. Sure, I think so ; 
And therefore, certainly, it were not good 
She knew his love, lest she make sport at it. 

Hero. Why, you speak truth : I never yet saw man, 
How wise, how noble, young, how rarely featur'd, 
But she would spell him backward : if fair-fac'd, 
She'd swear the gentleman should be her sister ; 
If black, why, nature, drawing of an antick, 
Made a foul blot : if tall, a lance ill-headed j 
If low, an agate very vilely cut : 
If speaking, why, a vane blown with all winds } 
If silent, why, a block moved with none. 
So turns she every man the wrong side out ; 
And never gives to truth and virtue that 
Which simpleness and merit purchaseth.'* 

These were happy materials for Shakspeare to 
work on, and he has made a happy use of them. 
Perhaps that middle point of comedy was never 
more nicely hit in which the ludicrous blends 
with the tender, and our follies, turning round 
against themselves in support of our affections, 
retriin nothing but their humanity. 

Dogberry and Verges in this play are inimitable 
specimens of quaint blundering and misprisions 
of meaning; and are a standing record of that 
formal gravity of pretension and total want of com- 
mon understanding, which Shakspeare no doubt co- 
pied from real life, and which in the course of two 
huiidied yenrs appear to have ascended from the 
lowest to the highest offices in the state. 
24 * 



AS YOU LIKE IT. 



Shakspeare has here converted the forest of 
Arden into another Arcadia, where they " fleet 
the time carelessly, as they did in the golden 
world." It is the most ideal of any of this author's 
plays. It is a pastoral drama, in which the in- 
terest arises more out of the sentiments and charac- 
ters than out of the actions or situations. It is 
not what is done, but what is said, that claims 
our attention. Nursed in solitude, " under the shade 
of melancholy boughs," the imagination grows soft 
and delicate, and the wit runs riot in idleness, 
like a spoiled child, that is never sent to school. 
Caprice and fancy reign and revel here, and stern 
necessity is banished to the court. The mild 
sentiments of humanity are strengthened with thought 
and leisure ; the echo of the cares and noise of 
the world strikes upon the ear of those " who have 
felt them knowingly," softened by time and dis- 
tance. ' They hear the tumult, and are still." The 
very air of the place seems lo breathe a spirit 
of philosophical poetry ; to stir the thoughts, to 
touch the heart with pity, as the drowsy fores,t 
rustles to the sighing gale. Never was there such 



I 



AS YOU LIKE IT. 288 

beautiful moralizing, equally free from pedantry or 

petulance. 

" And this their life, exempt from publick haunts, 
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing." 

Jaques is the only purely contemplative character 
in Shakspeare. lie thinks, and does nothing. His 
whole occupation is to amuse his mind, and he is 
totally regardless of his body and his fortunes. He 
is the prince of philosophical idlers ; his only pas- 
sion is thought; he sets no value upon any thing but 
as it serves as food for reflection. He can "suck 
melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs ;" 
the motley fool, "who morals on the time," is the 
greatest prize he meets with in the forest. He re- 
sents Orlando^s passion for Rosalind as some dispa- 
ragement of his own passion for abstract truth : and 
leaves the Duke, as soon as he is restored to his 
sovereigsity, to seek his brother out who has quitted 
it, and turned hermit. 

— " Out of these convertites 
There is much matter to be heard and learnt." 

Within the sequestered and romantick glades of 
the forest of Arden, they find leisure to be good and 
wise, or to play the fool and fall in love. Rosalind's 
character is made up of sportive gayety and natural 
tenderness : her tongue runs the faster to conceal the 
pressure at her heart. She talks herself out of 
breatii, only to get deeper in love. The coquetry 
with which she plays with her lover in the double 
character which she has to support, is managed with 
the nicest address. How full of voluble, laughing 
grace is all her conversatioa with Orlando — 



284 AS YOU LIKE IT. 

— " In heedless mazes running 
With wanton haste and giddy cunning." 

How full of real fondness and pretended cruelty 
is her answer to him when he promises to love her 
"For ever and a day !" 

*' Say a day without the ever : no, no, Orlando, men are April 
when they woo, December when they wed : maids are May when 
they are maids, but the sky changes when theyare wives: Twill be 
more jealous of thee than a Barbary cock-pigeon over liis hen ; more 
clamorous than a parrot against rain ; more new-fangled than an 
ape ; more giddy in ray desires than a monkey ; I will weep for 
nothing like Diana in the fountain, and 1 will do that when you are 
disposed to be merry ; I will laugh like a hyena, and that when yoii 
are inclined to sleep. 

Orlando. But will ray Rosalind do so ? 

Rosalind. By my life she will do as 1 do." 

The silent and retired character of Celia is a ne- 
cessary relief to the provoking loquacity of Rosa- 
lind, nor can any thing be better conceived or more 
beautifully described than the mutual affection be- 
tween the two cousins. 

— " We still have slept together, 
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together. 
And wlieresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans, 
Still we went coupled and inseparable." 

The unrequited love of Silvius for Phebe shews 
the perversity of this passion in the commonest 
scents of life, and the rubs and stops which nature 
throws in ils way, where fortune has placed none. 
Touchstone is not in love, but he will have a mis- 
tress as a subject for the exercise of his grotesque 
humour, and to shew his contem ,t fv;r the passion, 
by his indifference about the person. He is a rare 



AS YOU LIKE IT. 285 

fellow. He is a mixture of the ancient cynick phi- 
losopher witli the modern buffoon, and turns folly 
into wit, and wit into folly, just as the fit takes 
him. His courtship of Audrey not only throws a 
degree of ridicule on the state of Wedlock itself, 
but he is equally an e^iemy to the prejudices of 
opinion in other respects. The lofty tone of en- 
thusiasm, which the Duke and his companions in ex- 
ile spread over the stillness and solitude of a coun- 
try life, receives a pleasant shock from Touchstone's 
skeptical determination of the question. 

" Corin. Aud how like you this shepherd's life, Mr. Touch- 
stone ? 

Clown. Truly, shepherd, iu respect of itself, it is a good lifej 
but in respect that it is a shepherd's life, it is naught. In respect 
that it is solitary, I like it very well j but in respect that it is pri- 
vate, it is a very vile life. Now in respect it is in the fields, it pleas- 
eth me well ; but in respect it is not in the court, it is tedious. As it 
is a spare life, look you, it fits my humour ; but as there is no more 
plenty in it, it goes much against my stomach.''* 

Zimmerman's celebrated work on Solitude discover3 
only half the sense of this passage. 

There is hardly any of Shakspeare's plays that 
contains a greater number of passages that have been 
quoted in books of extracts, or a greater number of 
phrases that have become in a manner proverbial. 
If we were to give all the striking passages, we 
should give half the play. We will only recall a 
few of the most delightful to the reader's recollec- 
tion. Such are the meeting between Orlando and 
Adam, the exquisite appeal of Orlando to the hu- 
manity of the Duke and his company to supply him 
with food for the old man, and their answer, the 
Duke's description of a country life, and the account 



286 AS YOU LIKE IT. 

of Jaques moralizing on the wounded deer, his meet- 
ing with Touchstone in the forest, his apology for 
his own melancholy and his satirical vein, and the 
well known speech on the stages of human life, the 
old song of ^' Blow, blow, thou winter's wind," Ros- 
alind's description of the marks of a lover and of the 
progress of time with different persons, the picture of 
the snake wreathed round Oliver's neck while the 
lioness watches her sleeping prey, and Touchstone's 
lecture to the shepherd, his defence of cuckolds, 
and panegyrick on the virtues of " an If." — All of 
these are familiar to the reader : there is one passage 
of equal delicacy and beauty which may have es- 
caped him, and with it we shall close our account of 
As YOU LIKE IT. It is Phebe's description of Gani- 
med at the end of the third act. 

"Think not I love him, the' I ask for him j 
'Tis but a peevish boy, yet he talks well j — 
But what care I for words ! yet words do well, 
When he that speaks them pleases those that hear ; 
It is a pretty youth ; not veiy pretty ; 
But sure he's proud, and yet his pride becomes him ; 
He'll make a proper man j the best thiug in him 
Is his complexion ; and faster than his tongue 
Did ma"ke oflPence, his eye did heal it up : 
He is not very tall, yet for his years he's tall ; 
His leg is but so so, and yet 'tis well; 
There was a pretty redness in his lip, 
A little riper, and more lusty red 
Than that mix'd in his cheek ; 'twas just the difference 
Betwixt the constant red and mingled damask. 
There be some women, Silvius, had they mark'd him 
In parcels as I did, would have gone near 
To fall in love with him : but for my part 
1 love him not, nor hate him not; and yet 
I have.more cause to hate hira than to love him ; 
For what had he to do to chide at me?'* 



THE 



TAMING OF THE SHREW. 



The Taming of the Shrew is almost the only 
one of Shakspeare's comedies that has a regular 
plot, and downright moral. It is full of bustle, ani- 
mation, and rapidity of action. II shews admirably 
how self-will is only to be got the better of by 
stronger will, and how one degree of ridiculous per- 
versity is only to be driven out by another still 
greater. Petruchio is a madman in his senses; a 
very honest fellow, who hardly speaks a word of 
truth, and sticceeds in all his tricks and impostures. 
He acts his assumed character to the life, with the 
most fantastical extravagance, with complete pre- 
sence of mind, with untired animal spirits, and 
without a particle of ill humour from beginning to 
end. — The situation of poor Katherine, worn out 
by his incessant persecutions, become at last almost 
as pitiable as it is ludicrous, and it is difficult to say 
which to admire most, the unaccountableness of his 
actions, or the unalterableness of his resolutions. 



288 THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. 

It is a character which most husbands ought to study, 
unless perhaps the very audacity of Petruchio's at- 
tempt might alarm them more than his success 
would eucourage them. What a sound must the fol- 
lowing speech carry to some married ears ! 

*' Think you a little dio can daunt my ears ? 
Have I not in ray lime heard lions roar p 
Have I not heard the sea, puflTd up with winds, 
Rage like an angry boar, chafed with sweat ? 
Have I not heard great ordnance in the field ? 
And heav'n's artillery thunder in the skies ? 
Have { not iu a pitched battle heard 
Loud larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets clang P 
And do you tell me of a woman's tongue, 
That gives not half so great a blow to hear 
Ab will a cheauut in a farmer's fire ?" 

Not all Petruchio's rhetorick would persuade more 
than "some dozen followers" to be of this heretical 
way of thiaking. He unfolds his scheme for the 
Taming of the Shrew, on a principle of contradiction, 
thus : — 

" Pll woo her with some spirit when she comes. 
Say that she rail, why then I'll tell her plain 
She sings as sweetly as a nightingale ; 
Say that stie frown, I'll say she looks as clear 
As morning roses newiy wash'd with dew j 
Say she be mule, and will not speak a word, 
Then I'll commend her volubility, 
And say she uttereth piercing eloquence : 
If she do bid me pack, I'll give her thanks, 
As tho' she bid me stay by her a week ; 
If she deny to wed, I'll crave the day, 
When i shall ask the banns, and when be married ?" 

He accordingly gains her consent to the match, by 
telling her father that he has got it; disappoints 



THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. 289 

iier by not returning at the time he has promis- 
ed to wed her, and when he returns, creates no 
small consternation by the oddity of his dress and 
equipage. This however is nothing to the astonish- 
ment excited by his mad-brained behaviour at the 
marriage. Here is the account of it by an eye wit- 
ness : — 

" Grtmio. Tut, she's a lamb, a dove, a fool to him : 
I'll tell you. Sir Lucentio ; when the priest 
Should ask if Katherine should be his wife ? 
Ay, by gogs woons, quoth he ; and swore so loud, 
That, all amaz'd, the priest let fall the book ; 
And as he stooped again to take it up, 
This mad-brain'd bridegroom took him such a cuff, 
That down fell priest and book, and book and priest. 
Now take them up, quoth he, if any list. 

Tranio. What said the wench when he rose up again ? 

Grtmio. Trewbled and shook y for why, he stamp'd and 
swore. 
As if the vicar meant to cozen him. 
But after many ceremonies done. 
He calls for wine ; a health, quoth he ; as if 
He'd been aboard carousing with his mates 
After a storm; quaftoffthe muscadel. 
And threw the sops all in the sexton's facej 
Having no other cause but that his beard 
Grew thin and hungerly, and seem'd to ask 
His sops as he was drinking. This done, he took 
The bride about the neck, and kiss'd her lips 
With such a clamorous smack, that at their parting 
' All the church echoed : and I seeing this, 
Came thence for very shame ; and after me, 
I know, the rout is coming ; 
Such a mad marriage never was before." 



The most striking and at the same time laughable 
Pet 
25 



feature In the character of Petruchio throughout is 



290 THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. 

the studied approximation to the intractable charac- 
ter of real madness, his apparent insensibility to all 
external considerations, and utter indifference to 
every thing but the wild and extravagant freaks of 
his own self will. There is no contending with a 
person on whom nothing makes any impression but 
his own purposes, and who is bent on his own whims 
just in proportion as they seem to want common 
sense. With him a thing's being plain and reason- 
able is a reason against it. The airs he gives himself 
are iniinite, and his caprices are sudden as they are 
groundless. The whole of his treatment of his wife 
at home is in the same spirit of ironical attention and 
inverted gallantry. Every thing files before his will, 
like a conjuror's wand, and he only metamorphoses 
his wife's temper by metamorphosing her senses and 
all the objects she sees, at a word's speaking. Such 
are his insisting that it is the moon and not the sun 
which they see, &;c. This extravagance reaches its 
most pleasant and poetical height in the scene where, 
on their return to her father's they meet old Vincen- 
tio, whom Petruchio immediately addresses as a 
young lady : — 

" Petruchio. Good morrow, gentle mistress, where away P 
Tell me, sweet Kate, and tell me truly too, 
Hast thou beheld a fresher gentlewoman ? 
Such war of white and red within her cheeks ; 
What stars do spangle heaven with such beauty, 
As those two eyes becoa^e that heav'nly face ? 
Fair lovely maid, once more good day to thee : 
Sweet Kate, embrace her for her beauty's sake. 

Hortensio. He'll make the man mad to make a woman of 
him. 

Kaiherine. Young budding virgin, fair and fresh and sweef^ 
"Whither away, or where is thy abode ? 



THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. 291 

Happy the parents of so fair a child : 
Happier the man whom favourable stars 
Allot tiiee for his lovely bed-fellow. 

Petruchio. Why, how now, Kate, I hope thou art not mad : 
This is a man, old, wrinkled, faded, wither'd, 
And not a maiden, as thou say'st he is. 

Katkerine. Pardon, old father, my mistaken eyes 
That have been so bedazed with the sun 
That every thing I look on seemeth green. 
Now I perceive thou art a reverend father." 

The whole is carried off with equal spirit, as if 
the poet's comick Muse had wings of fire. It is 
strange how one man could be so many things; but 
so it is. The concluding scene, in which trial is 
made of the obedience of the new-married wives (so 
triumphantly for Petruchio) is a very happy one. — In 
some parts of this play there is a little too much 
about musick masters and masters of philosophy. 
They were things of greater rarity in those days 
than they are now. Nothing however can be bet- 
ter than the advice which Tranio gives his master 
for the prosecution of his studies : — 

*'jThe mathematicks, and the metaphysicks, 
Fall to them as you find your stomach serves you : 
iVo profit grows, where is no pleasure ta'en: 
In brief, sir, study what you most aflFect." 

We have heard the Honey Moon called *' an ele- 
gant Katherine and Petruchio." We suspect we do 
not understand this word elegant in the sense that 
many people do. But in our sense of the word, we 
should call Lucentio's description of his mistress ele- 
gant. 

" Tranio, 1 saw her coral lips to move, 
And with her breath she did perfume the air : 
Sacred and sweet was all 1 saw in her." 



292 THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. 

When Biondello tells the same Lucentio for his en- 
Gouragement, " I knew a wench married in an after- 
noon as she went to the garden for parsley to stuff 
a rabbit, and so may you, sir" — there is nothing ele- 
gant in this, and yet we hardly know which of the 
two passages is the best. 

The Taming of the Shrew is a play within a 
a play. It is supposed to be a play acted for the 
benefit of Sly the tinker, who is made to believe 
himself a lord, when he wakes after a drunken brawl. 
The character of Sly and the remarks with which 
he accompanies the play are as good as the play 
itself. His answer when he is asked how he likes 
it, " Indifferent well ; 'tis a good piece of work, 
would 'twere done," is in good keeping, as if he 
were thinking of his Saturday night's job. Sly 
does not change his tastes with his new situation, 
but in the midst of splendour and luxury still catls 
out lustily and repeatedly *' for a pot o' the smallest 
ale." He is very slow in giving up his personal 
identity in his sudden advancement. — "I am Chris- 
tophero Sly, call not me honour nor lordship. I 
ne'er drank sack in my life : and if you give me 
any conserves, give me conserves of beef: ne'er ask 
me what raiment I'll wear, for 1 have no more doub- 
lets than backs, no more stockings than legs, nor 
no more shoes than feet, nay, sometimes more feet 
than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through 
the over-leather.- — What, would you make me mad ? 
Am not I Christophero Sly, old Sly's son of Burton- 
heath, by birth a pedlar, by education a cardmaker, 
by transmutation a bear-herd, and now by present 
profession a tinker ? Ask Marian Hacket, the fat 



THE TAMING OF THE SHREV7. 293 

alewife of Wincot, if she know me not ; if she say 
I am not fourteen pence on the score for sheer ale, 
score me up for the lying'st knave in Christendom." 
This is honest. " The Slies are no rogues," as 
he says of himself. We have a great predilection 
for this representative of the family ; and what makes 
us like him the better is, that we take him to be of 
kin (not many degrees removed) to Sancho Panza. 



25 * 



MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 



1 HIS is a play as full of genius as it is of wisdom. 
Yet there is an original sin in the nature of the sub- 
ject, which prevents us from taking a cordial interest 
in it. " The height of moral argument," which the 
author has maintained in the intervals of passion or 
blended with the more powerful impulses of nature, 
is hardly surpassed in any of his plajs. But there is 
in general a want of passion ; the affections are at a 
stand; our sympathies are repulsed and defeated in 
all directions. The only passion which influences 
the story is that of Angelo; and yet he seems to 
have a much greater passion for hypocrisy than for 
his mistress. Neither are we greatly enamoured of 
Isabella's rigid chastity, though she could not act 
otherwise than she did. We do not feel the same 
confidence in the virtue that is " sublimely good" at 
another's expense, as if it had been put to some less 
disinterested trial. As to the Duke, who makes a 
very imposing and mysterious stage character, he is 
more absorbed in his own plots and gravity than 
anxious for the welfare of the state ; more tenacious 
of bis own character thao attentive to the feelings 



MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 295 

and apprehensions of others. Claudio is the only 
person who feels naturally ; and yet he is placed 
in circumstances of distress which almost preclude 
the wish for his deliverance. Mariana is also 
in love with Angelo, whom we hate. In this 
respect, there may be said to be a general system 
of cross-purposes between the feelings of the dififer- 
ent characters and the sympathy of the reader 
or the audience. This principle of repugnance 
seems to have reached its height in the character 
of Master Barnardine, who not only sets at defiance 
the opinions of others, but has even thrown off all self- 
regard, — " one that apprehends death no more dread- 
fully but as a drunken sleep ; careless, reckless, 
and fearless of what's past, present, and to come." 
He is a fine antithesis to the morality and the 
hypocrisy of the other characters of the play. Bar- 
nardine is Caliban transported from Prospero's wizard 
island to the forests of Bohemia or the prisons of 
Vienna. He is the creature of bad habits as Cali- 
ban is of gross instincts. He has however a strong 
notion of the natural fitness of things, according 
to his own sensations — " He has been drinking 
hard all night, and he will not be hanged that 
day*' — and Shakspeare has let him off at last. We 
do not understand why the philosophical German 
critick, Schlegel, should be so severe on those 
pleasant persons, Lucio, Pompey, and Master Froth, 
as to call them " wretches." They a|)pear all 
mighty comfortable in their occupations, and deter- 
mined to pursue them, *' as the flesh and fortune 
should serve." A very good exposure of the want 
of self-knowledge and contempt for olhersj which 



296 MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 

is so common in the world, is put into the. mouth 
of Abhorson, the jailor, when the Provost proposes 
to associate Pompey with him in his office — " A 
bawd, sir ? Fie upon him, he will discredit ouf 
mystery." And the same answer would serve in 
nine instances out of ten to the same kind of remark, 
" Go to, sir, you weigh equally ; a feather will 
turn the scale." Shakspeare was in one sense the 
least moral of all writers ; for morality (commonly 
so called) is made up of antipathies ; and his talent 
consisted in sympathy with human nature, in all 
its shapes, degrees, depressions, and elevations. 
The object of the pedantick moralist is to find 
out the bad in every thing : his was to shew that 
" there is some soul of goodness in things evil." 
Even Master Barnardine is not left to the mercy 
of what others think of him ; but when he comes in, 
speaks for himself, and pleads his own cause, as well 
as if counsel had been assigned him. In one 
sense, Shakspeare was no moralist at all : in another, 
lie was the greatest of all moralists. He was a 
moralist in the same sense in which nature is 
one. He taught what he had learnt from her. He 
shewed the greatest knowledge of humanity with the 
greatest fellow-feeiing for it. 

One of the most dramattck passages in the present 
play is the interview between Claudio and his sister, 
when she comes to inform him of the conditions on 
which Angelo will spare his life. 

" Claudio. Let me know the point. 

Isabella. O, 1 do fear thee, Claudio : and I quate. 
Lest thou a feverous life should'st entertain, 
And six or seven winters more respect 



MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 297 

Than a perpetual honour. Dar'st thou die p 
The sense of death is most in apprehension ; 
And the poor beetle, that we tread upon, 
In corporal sufiferance finds a pang as great 
As when a giant dies. 

Ctaudio. Why give you me this shame ? 
Think you 1 can a resolution fetch 
From flowery tenderness ; if I must die, 
I will encounter darkness as a bride, 
And hug it in mine arms. 

Isabella. Tbere spake my brother ! there my father's grave 
Did utter forth a voice ! Yes, thou must die : 
Thou art too uobie to conserve a life 
In base appliances. This outward sainted deputy — 
Whose settled visage and deliberate word 
Nips youth i' the head, and follies doth emmew, 
As falcon doth the fowl— is yet a devil. 

Claudia. The princely Angelo ? 

Isabella. Oh, 'tis the cunning livery of hell, 
The daraned'st body to invest and cover 
In princely guards ! Dost thou think, Claudio, 
Jf 1 would yield him my virginity, 
Thou might'st be freed ? 

Claudio. Oh, heavens ! it cannot be. 

Isabella. Yes, he would give it thee, for this rank ofiTeoce, 
So to oftend him still : this night's the time 
That I should do what I abhor to name, 
Or else thou dy'st to-morrow. 

Claudio. Thou shalt not do't, 

Isabella. Oh, were it but my life, 
I'd throw it down for your deliverance 
As frankly as a piu. 

Claudio. Thanks, dear Isabel. 

Isabella. Be ready, (Claudio, for your death to-morrow. 

Claudio. Yes. — Has he affections in him, 
That thus can n)ake him bite the law by the nose ? 
When he would force it, sure it is no sin ; 
Or of the deadly seven it is the least, 

Isabella. Which is the least ? 

Claudio. If it were damnable, he, being so wise, 
Why would he for the ..omentary trick 
Be perdurably 6o'd ? Oh, Isabel ! 



298 MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 

Isabella. What says my brother ? 

Claudio. Death is a fearful thing. 

Isabella. And shamed life a hateful. 

Claudio. Aye, but to die, and go we know Dot where j 
To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot ; 
This sensible warm motion to become 
A kneaded clod ; and the delighted spirit 
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside 
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice j 
To be imprison'd in the viewlesi winds, 
And blown with restless violence round about 
The pendant world ; or to be worse than worst 
Of those, that lawless and incertain thoughts 
Imagine howling ! — 'lis too horrible ! 
The weariest and most loathed worldly life, 
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment 
Can lay on nature, is a paradise 
To what we fear of death. 

Isabella. Alas ! alas ! 

Claudio. Sweet sister, let me live : 
What sin you do to save a brother's life, 
Nature dispenses with the deed so far, 
That it becomes a virtue." 

What adds to the dramatick beauty of this scene 
and the effect of Claudio's passionate attachment to 
life is, that it immediately follows the Duke's lec- 
ture to him^, in the character of the Friar, recom- 
mending an absolute indifference to it. 

— "Reason thus with life, — 
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing, 
That none but fools would keep : a breath thou art, 
Servile to all the skyey influences 
That do this habitation, where thou keep'st. 
Hourly afflict : merely, thou art death's fool ; 
For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun, 
And yet run'st toward him still : thou art not noble : 
For all the accommodations, that thou bear'st. 
Are DursM by baseness : thou art by no means valiant ; 



MEASURE FOR MEASURE. 299 

For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork 

Of a poor worm : thy best of rest is sleep, 

And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st 

Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself j 

For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains 

That issue out of dust : happy thou art not j 

For what thou hast not, still thou striv'st to get ; 

And what thou hast, forget'st : thou art not certain ; 

For thy complexion shifts to strange effects, 

After the moon ; if thou art rich, thou art poor ; 

For, like,an ass, whose back with ingots bows, 

Thou bear'st thy heavy riclies but a journey, 

And death unloads thee : friend thou hast none j 

For thy own bowels, which do call thee sire, 

The mere effusion of thy proper loins, 

Do curse the gout, serpigo, and t!ie rheum. 

For ending thee no sooner : thou hast nor youth, nor agej 

But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, 

Dreaming on both : for all thy blessed youth 

Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms 

Of palsied eld ; and when thou art old, and rich, 

Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty, 

To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this, 

That bears the name of life p Yet in this life 

Lie hid more thousand deaths ; yet death we fear, 

That makes these odds all even." 



THE 



MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR. 



The Merry Wives op Windsor is no doubt 
a very amusing play, with a great deal of humour, 
character, and nature in it: but we shouhl liave 
liked it much better, if any one else had been the 
hero of it, instead of Falstaff. We could have 
been contented if Shaksoeare had not been " com- 
manded to shew the knight in love." Wits and phi- 
loso;>hers, for the mosl part, do not shine in that 
character; and Sir John himself, by no means, 
comes off with flying colours. Many people com- 
plain of the degradation and insults to which Don 
Quixote is so frequently exposed in his various 
adventures. But what are the unconscious indigni= 
ties which he suffers, compared with the sensible 
mortifications which Falataff is made to bring upon 
himsHlf ? What are the blows and buffettings which 
the Don receives from the staves of the Yanguesian 
carriers, or from Sancho Fanz^'s more hard-hearted 
hands, compared with tlie contamination of the buck- 



THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR. 301 

basket, the disguise of the fat woman of Brentford, 
and the horns of Heme the hunter, which are dis- 
covered on Sir John's head ? In reading the play, 
we indeed wish him well through all these dis- 
comfitures, but it would have been as well if he 
had not got into them. Falstafif in the Merry 
Wives of Windsor is not the man he was in 
the two parts of Henry IF. His wit and elo- 
quence have left him. Instead of making a butt 
of others, he is made a butt of by them. Neither 
is there a single particle of love in him to excuse 
his follies : he is merely a designing, barefaced 
knave, and an unsuccessful one. The scene with 
Ford as Master Brook, and that with Simple, 
Slender's man, who comes to ask after the Wise 
Woman, are almost the only ones in which his old 
intellectual ascendency a|)[)ears. He is like a 
person recalled to the stage to perform an unac- 
customed and ungracious part ; and in which we 
perceive only " some faint sparks of those flashes 
of merriment, that were wont to set the hearers 
in a roar." But the single scene with Doll Tear 
sheet, of Mrs. Quickly's account of his desiring 
*' to eat some of housewife Keach's prawns," and 
telling her " to be no more so familiarity with 
such people," is worth the whole of the Merry 
Wives of Windsor put together. Ford's jea- 
lousy, which is the mainspring of the comick inci- 
dents is certainly very well managed. Page, on 
the contrary, appears to be somewhat uxorious 
in his disposition ; and we have pretty plain in- 
dications of the effect of the characters of the hus- 
bands on the different degrees of fidelity in their 



302 THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR. 

wives. Mrs. Quickly makes a very lively go-be- 
tween, both between FalstaflF and his Dulcineas, 
and Anne Page and her lovers, and seems in the 
latter case so intent on her own interest, as total- 
ly to overlook the intentions of her employers. 
Her master, Doctor Caius, the Frenchman, and 
her fellow^ servant Jack Bugby, are very com- 
pletely described. This last mentioned person is 
rather quaintly commended by Mrs. Quickly as 
" an honest, willing, kind fellow, as ever servant 
shall come in house withal, and I warrant you, 
no telltale, nor no breedbate ; his worst fault is 
that he is given to prayer ; he is something peev- 
ish that way ; but no body but has his fault." 
The Welch Parson, Sir -Hugh Evans (a title 
which in those days was given to the clergy) 
is an excellent character in all respects. He is 
as respectable as he is laughable. He has " very 
good discretions, and very odd humours." The 
duel scene with Caius gives him an opportuni- 
ty to shew his " cholers and his tremblings of 
mind," his valour and his melancholy, in an irre- 
sistible manner. In the dialogue, which at his 
mother's request he holds with his pupil, William 
Page, to shew his progress in learning, it is hard 
to say whether the simplicity of the master or 
the scholar is the greatest. Nym, Bardolph, and 
Pistol, are but the shadows of what they were; 
and Juslice Shallow himself has liltle of his con- 
sequence left. But his cousin. Slender, makes 
up-for the deficiency. He is a very potent piece 
of imbecility. In him the pretensions of the wor- 
thy Gloucestershire family are well kept up, and 



THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, 305 

immortalised. He and his friend Sackerson, and 
his book of songs, and his love of Anne Page, 
and his having nothing to say to her can never be 
forgotten. It is the only first rate character in 
the play : but it is in that class. Shakspeare is the 
only writer who was as great in describing weakness 
as strength. 



iUE 



COMEDY OF ERROUBS. 



This comedy is taken very much from the Me- 
naeehmi of Plautus, and is not an improvement on it. 
Shakspeare appears to have bestowed no great pains 
on it, and there are but a few passages which bear 
the decided stamp of his genius. He seems to 
have relied on his author, and on the interest arising 
out of the intricacy of the plot. The curiosity 
excited is certainly very considerable, though not of 
the most pleasing kind. We are teazed as with a 
riddle, which notwilhstandiog we try to solve. In 
reading the play, from the sameness of the names of 
the two Antipholises and the two Dromios, as well 
from their being constantly taken for each other by 
those who see them, it is difficult, without a painful 
effort of attention, to keep the characters distinct in 
the mind. And again, on the stage, either the com- 
plete similarity of their persons and dress must pro- 
duce the same perplexity whenever they first en*er, or 



THE COMEDY OF ERROURS. 305 

the identity of appearaDce which the story supposes, 
will be destroyed. We still, however, having a clue 
to the difficulty, can tell which is which, merely 
from the practical contradictions which arise, as 
soon as the different parties begin to speak ; and we 
are indemnified for the perplexity and blunders into 
which we are thrown, by seeing others thrown into 
greater and almost inextricable ones. — This play 
(among other considerations) leads us not to feel 
much regret that Shakspeare was not what is called 
a classical scholar. We do not think h\s forte would 
ever have lain in imitating or improving on what 
others invented, so much as in inventing for himself, 
and perfecting what he invented, — not perhaps by 
the omission of faults, but by the addition of the 
highest excellencies. His own genius was strong 
enough to bear him up, and he soared longest and 
best on unborrowed plumes. — The only passage of 
a very Shakspearian cast in this comedy is the one 
in which the Abbess, with admirable characteristick 
artifice, makes Adriana confess her own misconduct 
in driving her husband mad. 

*' Abbess. How long hath this possession held the man ? 

Adriana. This week he hath been heavy, sour, sad, 
And uiuch, much difFerent from the man he was j 
But, till this afternoon, his passion 
Ne'er brake into extremity of rage. 

Abbess. Hath he not lost much wealth by wreck at sea? 
Bury'd some dear friend ? Hath not else his eye 
Stray'd his afFection in unlawful love ? 
A sin prevailing much in youthful men, 
Who give their eyes the liberty of gazing. 
Which of these sorrows is he subject to ? 

Adriana. To none of these, except it be the last : 
Namely, some love, that drew him oft from home. 
26 * 



306 THE COMEDY OF ERROURS. 

Abbess. You should for that have reprehended him. 

Jdriana. Why, so I did. 

Abbess. But not rough enough. 

Adriana. As roughly as ray modesty would let me. 

Abbess. Haply, in private. 

Adiiana. And in assemblies too. 

Abbess. Aye, but not enough. 

Adriana. it was the copy of our conference ; 
In bed, he slept not for my urging it ; 
At board, he fed not for my urging it ; 
Alone it was the subject of my theme ? 
lu company, I often glanced at it ; 
Still did I tell him it was vile and bad. 

Abbess. A nd therefore came it that the man was mad r 
The venom'd clamours of a jealous woman 
Poison more deadly than a mad dog's tooth. 
It seems, his sleeps were hinder'd by thy railing : 
And therefore comes it that his head is light. 
Thou say'st his meat was sauc'd with thy upbraidings . 
Unquiet meals make ill digestions, 
Therefore the raging fire of fever bred : 
And what's a fever but a fit of madness ? 
Thou say'st his sports were hinder'd by thy brawlg ; 
Sweet recreation barr'd, what doth ensue, 
But moody and dull melancholy, 
Kinsman to grim and comfortless despair j 
And, at her heels, a huge infectious troop 
Of pale disteraperalures, and foes to life."* 
In food, in sport, aud life preserving rest 
To be disturbed would mad or man or beast ; 
The consequence is then, thy jealous fits 
Have scar'd thy husband from the use of wits. 

Lucirtna. She never reprehended him but mildly, 
When he demeaned himself rough, rude, and wildly. — 
Why bear you these rebukes and answer not ? 

Adriana. She did betray me to my own reproof." 

Pinch the conjuror is also an excrescence not to 
be found in Plaulus. He is indeed a very formidable 
anachronisQS. 



THE COMEDY OF ERROURS. 307 

" They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-fac'd villain, 
A nieer anatomy, a mountebank, 
A thread-bare juggler and a fortune-teller, 
A needy, hollow ey'd, sharp-looking wretch, 
A living dead man." 

This is exactly like some of the Puritanical portraits 
to be met with in Hogarth. 



DOUBTFUL PLATS. 



SHAKSPEARE. 



We shall give for the satisfaction of the reader what 
the celebrated German critick, Schlegel, says on 
this subject, and then add a very few remarks of our 
own. 

*' All the editors, with the exception of Capell, are 
unanimous in rejecting Titus Andronicus as unwor- 
thy of Shakspeare, though they always allow it to 
be printed with the other pieces, as the scape-goat, 
as it were, of their abusive criticism. The correct 
method in such an investigation is first to examine 
into the external grounds, evidences, &c. and to 
weigh their worth ; and then to adduce the internal 
reasons derived from the quality of the work. The 
criticks of Shakspeare follow a course directly the 
reverse of this ; they set out with a preconceived 
opinion against a piece, and seek, in justification of 
this opinion, to render the historical grounds sus- 



DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 30» 

picious, and to set them aside. Titus Andronicus is to 
be found in the first folio edition of Shakspeare's 
works, which it was known was conducted by He- 
niinge and Condell, for many years his friends and 
fellow-managers of the same theatre. Is it possi- 
ble to persuade ourselves that they would not have 
known if a piece in their repertory did or did not ac- 
tually belong to Shakspeare ? And are we to lay to 
the charge of these honourable men a designed fraud 
in this single case, when we know that they did 
not shew themselves so very desirous of scraping 
every thing together which went by the name of 
Shakspeare, but, as it appears, merely gave those 
plays of which they had manuscripts in hand ? Yet 
the following circumstance is still stronger: George 
Meres, a contemporary and admirer of Shakspeare, 
mentions Titus Andronicus in an enumeration of his 
works, in the year 1598. Meres was personally ac- 
quainted with the poet, and so very intimately, that 
the latter read over to him his Sonnets before they 
were printed. 1 cannot conceive that all the cri- 
tical skepticism in the world would be sufficient to 
get over such a testimony. 

" This tragedy, it is true, is framed according to a 
false idea of the tragick, which by an accumulation of 
cruelties and enormities degenerates into the horri- 
ble, and yet leaves no deep impression behind : the 
story of Tereus and Philomela is heightened and 
overcharged and under other names, and mixed up 
with the repast of Atreus and Thyestes, and many 
other incidents. In detail there is no want of beau- 
tiful lines, bold images, nay, even features which be- 
tray the peculiar conception of Shakspeare. Among 



310 DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 

these we may reckon the joy of the treacherous 
Moor at the blackness and ugliness of his child be- 
got in adultery ; and in the compassion of Titus An- 
dronicus, grown childish through grief, for a fly 
which had been struck dead, and his rage afterwards 
when he imagines he discovers in it his black ene- 
my, we recognize the future poet of Lear. Are the 
criticks afraid that Shakspeare's fame would be in- 
jured, were it established that in his early youth 
he ushered into the world a feeble and immature 
work ? Was Rome the less the conqueror of the 
world because Remus could leap over its first walls ? 
Let any one place himself in Shakspeare's situation 
at the commencement of his career. He found only 
a few indifiFerent models, and yet these met with the 
most favourable reception, because men are never 
difficult to please in the novelty of an art, before 
their taste has become fastidious from choice and 
abundance. Must not this situation have had its 
influence on him before he learned to make higher 
demands on himself, and by digging deeper in hig 
own mind, discovered the richest veins of a noble 
metal ? It is even highly probable that he must have 
made several failures before getting into the right 
path. Genius is in a certain sense infallible, and 
has nothing to learn; hut art is to be learned, and 
must be acquired by practice and experience. In 
Shakspeare's acknowledged works we find hardly 
any traces of his apprenticeship, and yet an appren- 
ticeship he certainly had. This every artist must 
have, and especially in a period where he has not 
before him the example of a school already formed. 
I consider it as extremely probable, that Shakspeare 



DOUBTFUL PLAYS, 311 

began to write for the theatre at a much earlier pe- 
riod than the one which is generally stated, namely, 
Dot till after the year 1390. It appears that, as 
early as the year 1584, when only twenty years 
of age, he had It^ft his paternal home and repaired to 
London. Can we im .gine that such an active head 
would remain idle for six whole years without mak- 
ing any attempt to emerge by his talents from an un- 
congenial situation ? That in the dedication of the 
poem of Venns and Adonis he calls it, " the first 
heir of his invention," proves nothing against the 
supposition. Il was (he first which he printed; he 
might have composed it at ati earlier period; per- 
hai)s, als:i, he did not include theatrical labours, as 
they then possessed but little literary dignity. The 
earlier Shukspeare begr.n to compose for the thea- 
tre, the less are we enabled to consider the immatu- 
rity and imperfection of a work as a proof of its 
s[>ui'iousness in opposition to historical evidence, if 
we only find in it prominent features of his mind. 
Several of the works rejected as spurious, may still 
have iieen produced iu the period betwixt Titus An- 
dronicits, and the earliest of the acknowledged 
pieces. 

* At last, Steevens published seven pieces as- 
cribed to Shaksf>eare iu tA^o ?uppl*^mentary volumes. 
It is to be remarked, that they all appeared in print 
in Shakspeare's life-time, with his name prefixed at 
|full length. They are the following; : — 

" 1. Locnnc. The proofs of the genuineness 
lof this piece are not altogether un.jm!»iguous ; the 
grounds fir doubt, on the other hand, are entitled to 
attention. However, this question is immediately 
connected with that respecting Titus Andronicus^ 



312 DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 

and must be at the same time resolved in the affirma- 
tive or negative. 

*'2. Pericles, Prince of Tyre. This piece was 
acknowledged by Dryden, but as a youthful work of 
Shakspeare. It is most undoubtedly his, and it has 
been admitted into several of the late editions. 
The supposed imperfections originate in the circum- 
stance, that Shfikspeare here handled a childish and 
extravagant romance of the old poet Gower, and 
■was unwilling to drag the subject out of its proper 
sphere. Hence he even introduces Gower himself, 
and makes him deliver a prologue entirely in his an- 
tiquated language and versification. This power of 
assuming so foreign a manner is at least no proof of 
helplessness. 

" 3. The London Prodigal. If we are not mis- 
taken, Lessing pronounced this piece to be Shak- 
speare's, and wished to bring it on the German 
stage. 

*'4. The Puritan; or, the Widow of Watling 
Street. One of my literary friends, intimately ac- 
quainted with Shakspeare, was of opinion that the 
poet must have wished to write a play for once in the 
style of Bea Jonson, and that in this way we must 
account for the difference between the present piece 
and his usual manner. To follow out this idea how- 
ever would lead to a very nice critical investiga- 
tion. 

" 5. Thomas, Lord Cromwell. 

'' 6. Sir John Oldcasfls— First Part. 

''7. A Yorkshire Tragedy. 

" The three last pieces are not only unquestiona- 
bly Shakspeare's, but in my opinion they deserve to 



DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 313 

be classed among his best and maturest works. — 
Steevens admits at last, in some degree, that they 
are Shakspeare's, as well as the others, excepting 
Locrine, but he speaks of all of them with great con- 
tempt, as quite worthless productions. This condem- 
natory sentence is not however in the slightest de- 
gree convincing, nor is it supported by critical acu, 
men. I should like to see how such a critick would, 
of his own natural suggestion, have decided on Shak- 
speare's acknowledged masterpieces, and what he 
would have thought of praising in them, had the 
publick opinion not imposed on him the duty of ad- 
miration. Thomas^ Lord Cromwell, and Sir John 
Oldcastle, are biographical dramas, and models in 
this species : the first is linked, from its subject, to 
Henri/ the Eighth, and the second to Henry the Fifth, 
The second part of Oldcastle is wanting ; I know 
not whether a copy of the old edition has been dis- 
covered in England, or whether it is lost. The 
Yorkshire Tragedy is a tragedy in one act, a dra- 
matised tale of murder : the tragical effect is over- 
powering, and it is extremely important to see 
how poetically Shakspeare could handle such a 
subject. 

" There have been still farther ascribed to him :— 
1st. The Merry Devil of Edmonton, a comedy in 
one act, printed in Dodsley's old plays. This has 
certainly some appearances in its favour. It con- 
tains a merry landlord, who bears a great similarity 
to the one in the Merry Wives of Windsor. How- 
ever, at all events, though an ingenious, it is but a 
hasty sketch. 2d. The Accusation of Paris. 3d. 
27 



314 DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 

The Birth of Merlin. 4th. Edward the Third. b{\\. 
The Fair Emma. 6tli. Mucedoms. 7 th. Jrden of 
Feversham. I have never seen any of these, and 
cannot therefore say any thing respecting them. 
From the passages cited, I am led to conjecture that 
the subject of Mucedorus is the popular story of Va- 
lentine and Orson ; a beautiful subject, which Lope 
de Vega has also taken for a play. Arden of Fever- 
sham is said to be a tragedy on the story of a man, 
from whom the poet was descended by the mother's 
side. If the quality of the piece is not too directly 
at variance with this claim, the circumstance would 
afford an additional probability in its favour.. For 
such motives were not foreign to Shakspeare : he 
treated Henry the Seventh, who ^bestowed lands on 
his forefathers for services performed by them, with 
a visible partiality. 

" Whoever takes from Shakspeare a play early 
ascribed to him, and confessedly belonging to his 
time, is unquestionably bound to answer, with some 
degree of probability, this question : Who has then 
written it ? Shakspeare's competitors in the drama- 
tick walk are pretty well known, and if those of 
them who have even acquired a considerable name, 
a Lilly, a Marlow, a Heywood, are still so very far 
below him, we can hardly imagine that the author 
of a work, which rises so high beyond theirs, would 
have remained unknown." — Lectures on Dramatick 
Literature, vol. ii. page 252. 

We agree to the truth of this last observation, 
but not to the justice of its application to some of the 
plays here mentioned. It is true that Shakspeare's 
best works are very superiour to those of Marlow, or 



DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 315 

Heywood, but it is not true that llie best of the 
doubtful plays above enumerated are S^ujieriour or 
even equal to the best of theirs. The Yorkshire 
Tragedy, which Sehlegel speaks of as an undoubted! 
production of our author's, is much more in the man- 
ner of Heywood than of Shakspeare. The effect is 
indeed overpowering, l)ut the mode of producing it 
is by no means poetical. The praise which Sehlegel 
gives to Thomas, Lord Cromwell, and to Sir John 
Oldcastle, is altogether exaggerated. They are 
very indifferent compositions, which have not the 
slightest pretensions to rank with Henry V. or Hen- 
ry VHI. We suspect that the German critick was 
not very well acquainted with the dramatick con- 
temporaries of Shakspeare, or aware of their general 
merits; and that he accordingly mistakes a resem- 
blance in style and manner for an equal degree of 
excellence. Shakspeare differed from the other 
writers of his age not in the mode of treating his 
subjects, but in the grace and power which he dis^ 
played in them. The reason assigned by a literary 
friend of Schlegel's for supposing The Puritan ; or^ 
the Widow of Wailing Street, to be Shakspeare's, viz. 
that it is tn the style of Ben Jonson, that is to 
say, in a style just the reverse of his own, is not 
very satisfactory to a plain English understanding. 
Locrine, and The London Prodigal, if they were 
Shakspeare's at all, must have been among the sins 
of his youth. Arden of Feversham contains several 
striking passages, but the passion which they ex- 
press is rather that of a sanguine temperament than 
of a lofty imagination ; and in this respect they ap- 
proximate more nearly to the style of other writers 



516 DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 

of the time than to Shakspeare's. Titus Andronicus 
is certainly as unlike Shakspeare's usual style as it 
is possible. It is an accumulation of vulgar physi- 
cal horrours, in which the power exercised by the 
poet bears no proportion to the repugnance excited 
by the subject. The character of Aaron the Moor, 
is the only thing which shews any originality of 
conception; and the scene in which he expresses 
his joy "at the blackness and ugliness of his child 
begot in adultery," the only one worthy of Shak- 
speare. Even this is worthy of him only in the 
display of power, for it gives no pleasure. Shak- 
apeare managed these things differently. Nor do 
we think it a sufficient answer to say that this was 
an embryo or crude production of the author. In 
its kind it is full grown, and its features decided and 
overcharged. It is not like a first imperfect essay, 
but shews a confirmed habit, a systematick prefer- 
ence of violent effect to every thing else. There 
are occasional detached images of great beauty and 
delicacy, but these were not beyond the powers of 
other writers then living. The circumstance which 
inclines us to reject the external evidence in favour 
of this play being Shakspeare's is, that the gramma- 
tical construction is constantly false and mixed up 
with vulgar abbreviatioHS, a fault that never oc- 
curs in any of his genuine plays. A similar de- 
fect, and the halting measure of the verse, are the 
chief objections to Pericles of Tyre, if we except 
the far-fetched and complicated absurdity of the 
story. The movement of the thoughts and pas- 
sions has something in it not unlike Shakspeare, 
and several of the descriptions are either the 



DOUBTFUL PLAYS. 317 

original hints of passages which Shakspeare has 
ingrafted on his other plays, or are imitations of them 
by some cotemporary poet. The most memorable 
idea in it is in Marina's speech, where she com- 
pares the world to *'a lasting storm, hurrying her 
from her friends." 



27 



POEMS AND SONNETS. 



Our idolatry of Shakspeare (not to say our admira- 
tion) ceases with his plays. In his other produc- 
tions, he was a mere author, though not a common 
author. It was only by representing others, that he 
became himself. He could go out of himself, and 
express the soul of Cleopatra; but in his own person, 
he appeared to be always waiting for the prompter's 
cue. In expressing the thoughts of others, he seem- 
ed inspired ; in expressing his own, he was a me- 
ehanick. The license of an assumed character was 
necessary to restore his genius to the privileges of 
nature, and to give him courage to break through 
the tyranny of fashion, the trammels cf custom. In 
his plays, he was " as broad and casing as the gene- 
ral air :" in his poems, on the contrary, he appears 
to be "cooped, and cabined in" by all the techni- 
calities of art, by all the petty intricacies of thought 
and language, which poetry had learned from the 
controversial jargon of the schools, where words 
had been made a substitute for things. There was, 
if we mistake not, something of modesty, and a 
painful sense of personal propriety at the bottom 



POEMS AND SONNETS. 319 

of this. Shakspeare's imagination, by identifying 
itself with the strongest characters in the most try- 
ing circumstances, grappled at once with nature, 
and trampled the littleness of art under his feet ; the 
rapid changes of situation, the wide range of the 
universe, gave him life and spirit, and afforded fult 
scope to his genius ; but returned into his closet 
again, and having assumed the badge of his profes- 
sion, he could only labour in his vocation, and con- 
form himself to existing models. The thoughts, the 
passions, the words which the poet's pen, " glanc- 
ing from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven," 
lent to others, shook off the fetters of pedantry and 
affectation; while his own thoughts and feelings, 
standing by themselves, were seized upon as lawful 
prey, and tortured to death according to the esta- 
blished rules and practice of the day. In a word, 
we do not like Shakspeare's poems, because we like' 
his plays : the one, in all their excellencies, are 
just the reverse of the other. It has been the fash- 
ion of laie to cry up our author's poems, as equal to 
his plays : this is the desperate cant of modern 
criticism. We would ask was there the slightest 
comparison between Shakspeare, and either Chaucer 
or Spenser, as mere poets ? Not any. — The two 
poems of Venus and Adonis and of Tarquin and 
Lucrece appear to us like a couple of ice-houses. 
They are about as hard, as glittering, and as cold. 
The author seems all the time to be thinking of his 
verses, and not of his subject, — not of what his cha- 
racters would feel, but of what he shall say; and as 
it must happen in all such cpses, he always puts 
into their mouths those things which they would be 



320 POEMS AN^D SONNETS. 

the last to think of, and which it shews the greatest 
ingenuity in him to find out. The whole is la- 
boured, up-hill work. The poet is perpetually sing- 
ling out the difficulties of the art to make an ex- 
hibition of his strength and skill in wrestling with 
them. He is making perpetual trials of them as if 
his mastery over them were doubted. The images, 
which are often striking, are generally applied to 
things which they are the least like : so that they 
do not blend with the poem, but seem stuck upon 
it, like splendid patch-work, or remain quite distinct 
from it, like detached substances, painted and var- 
nished over. A beautiful thought is sure to be lost 
in an endless commentarj^ upon it. The speakers 
are like persons who have both leisure and inclina- 
tion to make riddles on their own situation, and to 
twist and turn every object or incident into acros- 
ticks and anagrams. Every thing is spun out into 
allegory ; and a digression is always preferred to the 
main story. Sentiment is built up upon plays of 
words ; the hero or heroine feels, not from the im- 
pulse of passion, but from the force of dialecticks. 
There is besides a strange attempt to substitute the 
language of painting for that of poetry, to make us 
see their feelings in the faces of the persons; and 
again, consistently with this, in the description of 
the picture in Tarquin and Lucrece, those circum- 
stances are chiefly insisted on, which it would be 
impossible to convey except by words. The invo- 
cation to Opportunity in the Tarquin and Lucrece, 
is full of thoughts and images, but at the same time 
it is over-loaded by them. The concluding staa= 



POEMS AND SONNETS. 321 

za expresses all our objections to this kind of 
poetry : — 

" Oh ! idle words, servants to sliallow fools ; 
Unprofitable sounds, weak arbitrators j 
Busy yourselves in skill contending schools; 
Debate when leisure serves with dull debaters ; 
To trembling clients be their mediators : 
For me 1 force not argument a straw, 
Since that my case is past all help of law." 

The description of the horse in Venus and Ado- 
nis has been particularly admired, and not without 
reason : — 

" Round hoof'd, short jointed, fetlocks shag and long, 
Broad breast, full eyes, small head and nostril wide, 
High crest, short ears, strait legs, and passing strong, 
Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide, 
Look what a horse should have, he did not lack. 
Save a proud rider on so proud a back." 

Now this inventory of perfections shews great know- 
ledge of the horse ; and is good matter of fact poetry. 
Let the reader but compare it with a speech in the 
Midsummer Nighfs Dream where Theseus describes 
his hounds — 

" And their heads are hung 
With ears that sweep away the morning dew" — 

and he will perceive at once what we mean by the 
difference between Shakspeare's own poetry, and 
that of his plays. We prefer the Passionate Pilgrim 
very much to the Lover's Complaint. It has been 
doubted whether the latter poem is Shakspeare's. 

Of the sonnets we do not well know what to say. 
The subject of them seems to be somewhat equivo- 



322 POEMS AND SONNETS. 

cal ; but many of them are highly beautiful in them- 
selves, and interesting as they relate to the state of 
the personal feelings of the author. The following 
are some of the most striking : — 

CONSTANCY. 

" Let those who are in favour with their stars, 
Of publick honour and proud titles boast, 
Whilst I, whom fortune of such triumph bars, 
Unlook'd for joy in that I honour most. 
Great princes' favourites their fair leaves spread, 
But as the marigold in the sun's eye ; 
And in themselves their pride lies buried. 
For at a frown they in their glory die. 
The painful warriour famous'd for fight, 
After a thousand victories once foil'd, 
Is from the book of honour razed quite, 
And all the rest forgot for which he toil'd : 

Then happy I that love and am belov'd, 

Where I may not remove, nor be reroov'd." 

LOVE'S CONSOLATION. 

" When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, 

I all alone beweep my out cast state, 

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries^, 

And look upon myself, and curse my fate. 

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, 

Fcatur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd, 

Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, 

With what I most enjoy contented least : 

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, 

Haply I think on thee, — and then my state 

(Like to the lark at break of day arising 

From sullen eartii) sings hymns at heaven's gate ; 
For thy sweet love remember'd, such wealth brings, 
That then I scorn to change my state with kings." 

NOVELTY. 
•' My love is strengthen'd, though more weak in seeming f 
I love Dot less, though less the show appear : 



POEMS AND SONNETS. 323 

That love is raerchandis'd, whose rich esteeming 

The owner's tongjie doth publish every where. 

Our love was new, and then but in the spring 

When I was wont to greet it with my lays : 

As Philomel in summer's front doth sing. 

And stops his pipe in growth of riper days : 

Not that the summer is less pleasant now 

Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night, 

But that wild musick burdens every bough, 

And sweets grown common lose their dear delight. 

Therefore, like her, I sometime hold my tongue. 

Because I would not dull you with my song." 

LIFE'S DECAY. 
*' That time of year thou may'st in me behold 

When yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang 

Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 

Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. 

In me thou see'st the twilight of such day, 

As after sun-set fadeth in the west. 

Which by and by black night doth take away, 

Death's secotid self, that seals up all in rest. 

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire. 

That on the ashes of his youth doth lie. 

As the death bed whereon it must expire, 

Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by. 

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, 
To love that well which thou must leave ere long." 

In all these, as well as in many olhers, there is a 
mild tone of sentiment, deep, mellow, and sustained 
very different from the crudeuess of his earlier poems. 



Tfifl: END. 



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